Page - 85 - in Emerging Technologies for Electric and Hybrid Vehicles

energies Article ElectricVehicles inLogisticsandTransportation: ASurveyonEmergingEnvironmental,Strategic, andOperationalChallenges AngelAlejandroJuan1,*,CarlosAlbertoMendez2, JavierFaulin3, JesicadeArmas1 andScottErwinGrasman4 1 ComputerScienceDepartment, Internet InterdisciplinaryInstitute,OpenUniversityofCatalonia, 08018Barcelona,Spain; jde_armasa@uoc.edu 2 InstitutodeDesarrolloTecnológicopara la IndustriaQuímica,UniversidadNacionaldelLitoral,CONICET, 3000SantaFe,Argentina; cmendez@intec.unl.edu.ar 3 StatisticsandOperationsResearchDepartment,PublicUniversityofNavarre,31006Pamplona,Spain; javier.faulin@unavarra.es 4 IndustrialandSystemsEngineering,Rochester InstituteofTechnology,Rochester,NY14623,USA; segeie@rit.edu * Correspondence: ajuanp@uoc.edu;Tel.:+34-93-326-3600;Fax:+34-93-356-8822 AcademicEditor:K.T.Chau Received: 14December2015;Accepted: 25 January2016;Published: 28 January2016 Abstract:Current logisticsandtransportation (L&T)systems includeheterogeneousfleetsconsisting of common internal combustion enginevehicles aswell as other types of vehicles using “green” technologies, e.g., plug-in hybrid electric vehicles and electric vehicles (EVs). However, the incorporation of EVs in L&T activities also raise some additional challenges from the strategic, planning,andoperationalperspectives. For instance, smartcitiesarerequiredtoproviderecharge stations forelectric-basedvehicles,meaningthat investmentdecisionsneedtobemadeabout the number, location,andcapacityof thesestations. Similarly, the limiteddriving-rangecapabilitiesof EVs,whichare restrictedby theamountof electricity stored in theirbatteries, imposenon-trivial additionalconstraintswhendesigningefficientdistributionroutes.Accordingly, thispaper identifies andreviewsseveralopenresearchchallenges related to the introductionofEVs inL&Tactivities, including: (a) environmental-related issues; and (b) strategic, planning and operational issues associatedwith“standard”EVsandwithhydrogen-basedEVs. Thepaperalsoanalyzeshowthe introduction of EVs in L&T systems generates newvariants of thewell-knownVehicle Routing Problem, one of the most studied optimization problems in the L&T field, and proposes the use of metaheuristics and simheuristics as the most efficient way to deal with these complex optimizationproblems. Keywords: electricvehicles; logisticsandtransportation;greenvehicle routingproblems 1. Introduction Logisticsandtransportation (L&T)activities representakeysector inworldwideeconomies,and are a significant contributor to social andeconomicprogress inmodern societies. Theprevalence of theL&T industry isdue to its constantgrowthand impact in termsof regionalGrossDomestic Product (GDP). Inparticular, roadL&Tactivitiesusingmotorizedvehicleshavesignificantly increased in response to the rise of globalization and commercial interchanges among countries. With the aim of making them more efficient, L&T systems have been widely studied by the Operations Research/ComputerScience (OR/CS)communities fordecades.Dueto itspotentialapplications to real-life operations, oneof themost recurrent topics in theL&T literature is that ofmodelingand Energies 2016,9, 86;doi:10.3390/en9020086 www.mdpi.com/journal/energies85