IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INDUSTRIAL ELECTRONICS, VOL. 57, NO. 2, FEBRUARY 2010 641 Development of a Dual-Fuel Power Generation System for an Extended Range Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicle Matt Van Wieringen and Remon Pop-Iliev Abstract—In recent decades, there has been a growing global concern with regard to vehicle-generated greenhouse gas emis- sions and the resulting air pollution. In response, automotive original equipment manufacturers focus their efforts on develop- ing “greener” propulsion solutions in order to meet the societal demand and ecological need for clean transportation. Hydrogen is an ideal vehicle fuel for use not only in fuel cells (FCs) but also in a spark-ignition internal combustion engines (ICEs). The combustion of hydrogen (H 2 ) fuel offers vastly superior tail-pipe emissions when compared with gasoline and can offer improved performance. H 2 is ideally suited for use in an extended range plug-in hybrid electric vehicle architecture where engine efficiency can be optimized for a single engine speed. H 2 ICEs are signifi- cantly more cost effective then an equivalent-sized H 2 FC making them a better near-term solution. Before hydrogen can replace gasoline and diesel as the main source of automotive fuel, a num- ber of hurdles must first be overcome. One such hurdle includes developing a suitable hydrogen infrastructure, which could take decades. As such, dual-fuel capabilities will help to create a transi- tion between gasoline- and hydrogen-powered vehicles in the near term, while a full-service hydrogen infrastructure is developed. Index Terms—Electric vehicle, emission, fuels, generator, hybrid, hydrogen, internal combustion engines (ICEs), plug-in. I. I NTRODUCTION T HIS PAPER represents an expanded and enhanced version of the originally published conference paper in which general design strategies were presented for a novel dual- fuel extended range plug-in hybrid electric vehicle (E-REV) conversion concept [3]. This paper discusses specifically the design of the power generation subsystem which converts, stores, and supplies energy to the vehicle’s drive system and various other subsystems. Such systems include the following: power electronics, logic controllers, and communication sys- tems. In addition, this paper quantifies the power generation system by presenting emissions and performance results related to conversion of a 250-cm 3 dune buggy from a conventional gasoline spark-ignition (SI) internal combustion engine (ICE) configuration to the dual-fuel (hydrogen + gasoline) archi- tecture. The prototype of the dune buggy E-REV conversion project is shown in Fig. 1. Manuscript received February 26, 2009; revised July 28, 2009. First pub- lished August 18, 2009; current version published January 13, 2010. The authors are with the Faculty of Engineering and Applied Science, University of Ontario Institute of Technology, Oshawa, ON L1H 7K4, Canada (e-mail: matt.vanwieringen@gmail.com; remon.pop-iliev@uoit.ca). Color versions of one or more of the figures in this paper are available online at http://ieeexplore.ieee.org. Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/TIE.2009.2029516 Fig. 1. Dual-fuel E-REV conversion. The power generation subsystem is comprised of the respec- tive gasoline and hydrogen fuel storage and delivery systems, the IC engine, batteries, battery management system (BMS), electric generator, and the necessary electronics and controls. The power generation architecture for the prototype is shown in Fig. 4. Using the dual-fuel E-REV architecture, the vehicle can be run on electricity for short duration trips providing sufficient range for a vast majority of daily commuters (∼65 km). The batteries can be recharged each night during off-peak hours by plugging the vehicle into a standard 120/240 VAC outlet. For longer trips, the range can be extended using hydrogen in an IC engine to turn an electric generator and recharge the vehicles onboard batteries. Hydrogen can be refilled from home everyday using an electrolyzer or small methane gas reformer. In the future, hydrogen fueling equipment could be added to existing gasoline/diesel stations. For long trips, the range can be further extended using gasoline in the same IC engine. Dual-fuel capabilities will optimize low emissions travel while allowing the vehicle to tap into the existing gasoline distribution network until hydrogen becomes more readily available to the light vehicle transportation market. Although the hydrogen infrastructure/economy is still many years away from being a reality, there is a significant oppor- tunity in the near term to develop an intermediary vehicle 0278-0046/$26.00 © 2010 IEEE