Battery Electric Vehicle Powertrain Modeling, Simulation, and Performance Analysis

Abstract

Battery Electric Vehicles (BEVs) have been receiving a great attention among the many different powertrain configurations of electrified vehicles. There is intense competition among automakers in terms of optimizing the BEVs’ powertrain and improving their fuel economy, range, and other performance criteria. It is essential to conduct extensive simulations and model tuning before prototyping and testing. Hence, in this study, a detailed comprehensive model is developed and tuned to simulate the BEV powertrain. The model is tuned to closely match a common commercial BEV, the 2019 Nissan Leaf, in terms of powertrain specifications and driving performance. The validity of the developed model is established by testing it using three US Environmental Protection Agency drive cycles. The simulation results show a close similarity between the performance of the simulated model and the performance of the selected commercial BEV, which supports the usefulness of the developed model for future powertrain improvements. Furthermore, the effect of energy losses on driving performance is highlighted. The simulation results of the developed BEV model show a superior performance in terms of fuel economy when compared with the conventional, hybrid fuel cell/ battery, hybrid series electric, and hybrid parallel electric vehicle models.