Advanced control in energy systems and review of future developments in marine energy system control

Abstract

The trend of electrification of propulsion systems also introduced all-electric drive in the maritime sector. Maritime all-electric drive systems operate using an energy system containing a variety of components, such as batteries, internal combustion engines, or fuel cells. The introduction of new components in the energy system increases both the flexibility as well as the complexity of the system operation. The most commonly used rule-based control is no longer sufficient to solve the control problem. Consequently, the usage of advanced control strategies in maritime has become a topic of research in recent years. In the operation of a maritime energy system, several objectives are of interest as targets of the optimisation, including cost, emission, or an enlargement of component lifetime. Depending on the choice of objective, the control strategy can differ. By integrating multiple objectives in control, the operation is optimised to find the best working point to fulfil the different interests. This article first reviews the commonly used advanced control structures in the maritime, automotive, and building control sectors. A comparison is used to identify further potential for advanced control usage in marine applications. In addition, the implementation of advanced control is reviewed in architecture and optimisation algorithms. Secondly, the control objectives used in the literature are presented and analysed in terms of their usage and potential of the combination. Thirdly, the currently used validation strategies and published results are reviewed and interpreted in terms of potential and required future work. Lastly, open gaps in the state of research are identified and potential for future work is outlined.