Energy-Optimized Routing of Electric Vehicles in Urban Delivery Systems

Battery electric vehicles seem to offer great opportunities in context with ecological compatibility of urban transport systems. Along with the technical innovations appropriate operating models are required. In this contribution we propose an extension of the Vehicle Routing Problem, which adapts most of the needs for operating electric vehicles. This includes an objective function that considers energy consumption depending on driving resistances and loading weight, as well as additional restrictions to handle the maximum range depending on battery capacity and recharging options. To illustrate the problem a set of test instances is solved. For this purpose we present an adapted tabu search heuristics. The results are analyzed in respect of changes compared to distance-based optimization and the influence of battery capacity.