Intelligent Electric Motor Drives with Improved Performance and Reliability for Electrified Vehicles

为了提高车辆的燃油经济性和减少温室气体排放，汽车公司正在增加其车辆的电气化，包括乘用车、公共交通车辆、卡车和火车。能源、牵引电机及其驱动等电力动力总成部件是为电动车提供牵引动力的重要子系统。在过去的十年中，这些牵引电力动力总成部件取得了重大进展，如低成本和轻量化的电池、更高效的电动马达和紧凑型电力驱动。然而，汽车行业和政府仍然呼吁进行创新研究和开发，以提高电动总成的效率、性能、可靠性和耐用性。本研究方案的重点是开发下一代智能电机驱动装置，从系统层面提高牵引电力传动系统的整体性能和可靠性。这一智能将使拟议中的电机驱动器成为电动总成系统的“大脑”，而不是一个组件。更具体地说，通过分析动力总成系统的输入和观察输出，所提出的智能电机驱动器能够在运行期间自学习和决策，以实现更高的性能和可靠性。在各种牵引电机中，永磁同步电机(PMSM)在电动汽车中的应用占主导地位，因此本文的研究将主要集中在PMSM驱动方面。拟议研究的具体主题包括全面的建模、准确的机器和驱动器参数识别、故障检测和容错控制、PMSM驱动器的最大效率/转矩控制策略，以及可能扩展到其他电机驱动器。更重要的是，智能控制理论将被研究并应用于所提出的电机驱动，以超越目前的技术标准。因此，拟议的研究将有助于推动电动汽车技术的发展，并在短期内为加拿大汽车原始设备制造商(OEM)和供应商提供产品可实施的解决方案，最终目标是使交通电气化广泛为消费者所接受。

In an effort to improve the fuel economy of vehicles and to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, automotive companies are increasing the electrification of their vehicles including passenger cars, public transit vehicles, trucks and trains. The electric powertrain components, such as the energy source, traction electric machines and their drives are important subsystems providing the traction power for electrified vehicles. In the past decade, significant advances have been made to these traction electric powertrain components, such as low cost and lightweight batteries, more efficient electric motors and compact electric drives. However, the automotive industry and government still call for innovative research and developments to improve the electric powertrain efficiency, performance, reliability and durability. This research proposal focuses on developing the next-generation intelligent electric motor drives to improve the overall performance and reliability of the traction electric powertrain at a system level. The intelligence will make the proposed motor drive to be the "brain" instead of one component in the electric powertrain system. More specifically, through analyzing the inputs and observing the outputs of the powertrain system, the proposed intelligent electric motor drive is capable of self-learning and decision making during operation to achieve an improved performance and reliability. Among various traction electric machines, the permanent magnet synchronous machine (PMSM) is dominantly used in electrified vehicle applications, so the proposed research will be primarily focused on PMSM drives. The specific topics of the proposed research encompass comprehensive modeling, accurate machine and drive parameter identification, fault detection and fault tolerant control, and maximum efficiency/torque control strategies for the PMSM drives as well as a possible extension to other electric machine drives. More importantly, intelligent control theory will be investigated and applied in the proposed electric machine drive to exceed the current standard of technology. Therefore, the proposed research will help advance electrified vehicle technologies and provide the Canadian automotive original equipment manufacturers (OEM) and suppliers with product implementable solutions in the near-term with an ultimate aim of making transportation electrification widely acceptable to the consumers.