Predictive Control for Energy Management in Ship Power Systems under High-power Ramp Rate Loads

Abstract: Electrical weapons and combat systems integrated into ships create challenges for their power systems. The main challenge is operation under high-power ramp rate loads, such as rail-guns and radar systems. When operated, these load devices may exceed the ships generators in terms of power ramp rate, which may drive the system to instability. Thus, electric ships require integration of energy storage devices in coordination with the power generators to maintain the power balance between distributed resources and load devices. In order to support the generators by using energy storage systems, an energy management scheme must be deployed to ensure load demand is met. This paper proposes and implements an energy management scheme based on model predictive control to optimize the coordination between the energy storage and the power generators under high-power ramp rate conditions. The simulation and experimental results validate the proposed technique in a reduced scale, notional electric ship power system.