Optimal Battery Sizing for Electric Truck Delivery

Finding the cost-optimal battery size in the context of parcel delivery with Electric Vehicles (EVs) requires solving a tradeoff between using the largest possible battery (so as to maximize the number of deliveries over a given time) and the relative costs (initial investment plus the unnecessary i...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Donkyu Baek, Yukai Chen, Naehyuck Chang, Enrico Macii, Massimo Poncino
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: MDPI AG 2020-02-01
Series:Energies
Subjects:
Online Access:https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/13/3/709
Description
Summary:Finding the cost-optimal battery size in the context of parcel delivery with Electric Vehicles (EVs) requires solving a tradeoff between using the largest possible battery (so as to maximize the number of deliveries over a given time) and the relative costs (initial investment plus the unnecessary increase of the truck weight during delivery). In this paper, we propose a framework for the optimal battery sizing for parcel delivery with an electric truck; we implement an electric truck simulator including a nonlinear battery model to evaluate revenue, battery cost, charging cost, and overall profit for annual delivery. Our framework finds the cost-optimal battery size for different parcel weight distributions and customer location distributions. We analyze the effect of battery sizing on the profit, which is up to 56%.
ISSN:1996-1073