Two-stage on-board optimization of merging velocity planning with energy management for HEVs

This paper proposes a two-stage hierarchy control system with model predictive control (MPC) for connected parallel HEVs with available traffic information. In the first stage, a coordination of on-ramp merging problem using MPC is presented to optimize the merging point and trajectory for cooperative merging. After formulating the merging problem into a nonlinear optimization problem, a continuous/GMRES method is used to generate the real-time vehicle acceleration for two considered HEVs running on main road and merging road, respectively. The real-time acceleration action is used to calculate the torque demand for the dynamic system of the second stage. In the second stage, an energy management strategy (EMS) for powertrain control that optimizes the torque-split and gear ratio simultaneously is composed to improve fuel efficiency. The formulated nonlinear optimization problem is solved by sequential quadratic programming (SQP) method under the same receding horizon. The simulation results demonstrate that the vehicles can merge cooperatively and smoothly with a reasonable torque distribution and gear shift schedule.