Energy Optimization for Platooning through Utilizing the Road Topography

Abstract: The road haulage industry is a fundamental part of today’s society. The companies of haulage stand before a challenge, as the environmental and economic sustainability demands are increasing. The automotive industry tries to meet these demands by developing intelligent systems that will decrease the fuel consumption. The two systems, predictive controller and platooning, are two intelligent solutions that help to decrease the fuel consumption. A predictive controller uses the knowledge of the future road topography to calculate an optimal velocity profile that utilizes the energy stored in the altitude differences. Platooning describes the concept of driving several vehicles in a close formation. The vehicles are controlled autonomously in the longitudinal direction, which enables a short intermediate distance between the vehicles and a reduction of the decelerating aerodynamic drag force. In this thesis, a predictive platoon controller has been developed that takes both the topography and the possible reduction of the aerodynamic drag force into account. Two main different platoon control strategies are evaluated. The result shows that the aerodynamic drag has a large influence of the fuel consumption and that a short intermediate distance between the vehicles will often reduce the consumption. However, the road topography has an influence on the driving profile and in some scenarios it would be beneficial to increase the intermediate distance to avoid using the vehicle’s brake. The result shows that predictive platoon control enables a fuelefficient velocity profile, though, more scenarios should be analysed to draw further conclusions about the strategy.