The multi-period vehicle routing problem with refueling decisions: Traveling further to decrease fuel cost?

• Type: Article in International Scientific Journal
• Date: 2020

Authors

Fábio Neves Moreira (Author) Other; Mário Amorim Lopes (Author) Other; Pedro Amorim (Author) FEUP

Journal

Title: Transportation Research Part E: Logistics and Transportation Review

Vol. 133

Pages: 1-21

ISSN: 1366-5545

Publisher: Elsevier

Indexing

ISI Web of Knowledge - 15 Citations

Scopus - 17 Citations

Other information

Authenticus ID: P-00R-FQ4

DOI: 10.1016/j.tre.2019.11.011

Abstract (EN): Most vehicle routing approaches disregard the need to refuel fleets. However, planners search for opportunities to refuel at lower prices even if, counter-intuitively, distant fuel stations need to be visited. We propose a novel mathematical formulation and develop branch-and-cut and matheuristic algorithms to efficiently tackle this problem. Results indicate that, to minimize costs, detour distances may increase up to 6 percentage points when fuel stations with lower prices are farther away from the depot. For practice, these insights imply that current policies disregarding station location and/or fuel prices along with "myopic" planning horizons may lead to sub-optimal decisions.

Language: English

Type (Professor's evaluation): Scientific

No. of pages: 21