Test bench model and algorithms for multi-sources light electric vehicle energy management system

Due to the increasing awareness of oil depletion and the growing appreciation for green technology, electric vehicles (EVs) are now a widespread form of vehicle transportation. Single-source EVs such as battery electric vehicles (BEVs) have the drawbacks of limited life cycles and self-discharge. This paper proposes a test bench model to evaluate the performance of a multi-source light electric vehicle (LEV) energy management system (EMS) to overcome the shortcomings of single-source EVs. The EMS model contains intelligent switching controller hardware that is designed and implemented to select the most efficient energy source. The circuit board contains a DC chopper that can drive any DC load and is connected to a dSPACE DS1104 digital signal processor (DSP) for real-time data acquisition. Experimental results validate that the multi-source powered LEV can achieve both the standard drive cycles regulations ECE-47 and ECE-15. To evaluate the power efficiency in the extended ECE-47 cycle, the multi-source LEV performs better than that of a single source vehicle, with approximately 6% power efficiency. Thus, this research demonstrates that the proposed EMS based multi-source EV could be a potential candidate for future vehicle applications.