Energy-Efficient Feedback Control Strategy of Vehicle Platoon on Highway with Varying Slopes

Vehicle platoon is a typical application of connected and automated vehicle, and known for its energy saving potential because smaller inter vehicle spacing implies less aerodynamic drag. However, the regular platooning control method may lead redundant energy consumption because unnecessary vehicle acceleration and deceleration of the following vehicles may occur for the purpose of tracking leading vehicle’s velocity precisely. To improve the energy efficiency of platoon operation, this paper proposes an energy-efficient control strategy for homogeneous platoon on highway with varying slopes. The range of control gains for the state feedback controller is derived based on the string stability analysis. The optimal control gains are calculated by using genetic algorithm (GA). The simulation results for a platoon with five electric vehicles indicate 2.213% energy consumption reduction can be achieved by optimizing the control gains on terrain road.