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A meta-heuristic for capacitated green vehicle routing problem

  • RAOTA-2016
  • Published:
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Abstract

The capacitated green vehicle routing problem is considered in this paper as a new variant of the vehicle routing problem. In this problem, alternative fuel-powered vehicles (AFVs) are used for distributing products. AFVs are assumed to have low fuel tank capacity. Therefore, during their distribution process, AFVs are required to visit alternative fuel stations (AFSs) for refueling. The design of the vehicle routes for AFVs becomes difficult due to the limited loading capacity, the low fuel tank capacity and the scarce availability of AFSs. Two solution methods, the two-phase heuristic algorithm and the meta-heuristic based on ant colony system, are proposed to solve the problem. The numerical experiment is performed on the randomly generated problem instances to evaluate the performance of the proposed algorithms.

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Acknowledgements

This research is partially supported by University Start-up Research Grant from Asper School of Business, University of Manitoba, Canada.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Asper School of Business, University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, MB, R3T5V4, Canada

    Shuai Zhang, Yuvraj Gajpal & S. S. Appadoo

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  1. Shuai Zhang
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  2. Yuvraj Gajpal
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  3. S. S. Appadoo
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Correspondence to Yuvraj Gajpal.

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Zhang, S., Gajpal, Y. & Appadoo, S.S. A meta-heuristic for capacitated green vehicle routing problem. Ann Oper Res 269, 753–771 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10479-017-2567-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10479-017-2567-3

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