Study on Range Improvement Controls and Method for Electric Vehicles

Electric Vehicles are rapidly growing in the market yet various failure incidents were noted all along the globe. On the other hand, range anxiety has greatly inspired manufacturers to explore new practices to improve. One of the most important components of an EV is the battery, which converts chemical energy to electrical energy thereby liberating heat energy as the loss. This heat loss when high, capability of system to deliver required energy to wheels is reduced significantly. With a higher heat loss in the battery, system is prone to failure or reduced mileage. Therefore, controlling/maintaining system temperature under safe usable zone even during harsh conditions is ideal. Simple reduction in energy consumption of electrical cooling/heating devices used with regenerative energy techniques can greatly help in range improvement. The intention of this paper is to explore easy methods to improve electric vehicle range in different ambient conditions. Few of the key benefactors here are regenerative braking, a solar roof and defogging method used along a course of WLTP cycle followed with a highway drive till the end of state of charge. We have considered a generic HVAC system with a climate control function. Although, an enhanced strategy is already implemented for Powertrain, Fan and Pump controls which has been done prior to the suggested methods in this paper. Furthermore, we are accounting for the effect of controls on the system to diversify and optimize the power requirement. Real World scenarios are replicated in 1D simulation tool for making a comparison between a normal driving mode and enhanced range gain mode. The observations here depict the study on range improvement controls and methods for analyzing vehicle performance in cold and hot climate specific to an electric passenger car.