Traffic Modeling of a Cooperative Charge while Driving System in a Freight Transport Scenario

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to present a research study on a traffic model developed for analysing the performance of the wireless inductive systems for charging while driving (CWD) fully electric vehicles (FEVs) from both traffic and energy points of view. The design assumptions of the developed traffic model are aimed to simulate in particular a freight distribution service in a fully cooperative traffic environment. In this case, the CWD service could be used to guarantee the minimum state of charge (SOC) of the batteries at the arrival to the depot that allows the vehicles to shortly start with further activities. In this way, the fleet manager could avoid wasting time for the stationary recharge, thus increasing the level of service of the freight distribution. The CWD system is applied to a multilane ring road with several intermediate on-ramp entrances, where the slowest lane is reserved for the dynamic charging activities, when authorized vehicles are present. A specific traffic model has been developed and implemented adopting a mesoscopic approach, where vehicle energy needs and charging opportunities affect drivers' behavior. Overtaking maneuvers, as well as new entries in the CWD lane of vehicles that need to charge, have been modeled by taking into account a fully cooperative driving system among vehicles which manages adequate gaps between consecutive vehicles. Finally, a speed control strategy in which vehicles can be delayed to create an empty time-space slot in the CWD lane, is simulated at a defined node. This type of control, though is simulated to allow extraordinary maintenance operations, which may require a free charging zone for a given time slot, could also be applied to support merging maneuvers for on ramp vehicles.

Reducing Range Anxiety by Unifying Networks of Charging Stations

“…While battery swapping might take as much time as it takes to fill the tank in ICE vehicles [27], CWD systems, in which the driver does not need to worry about charging station and spending long time to charge up the EV [31]- [35], will increase the driving range, and provide convenience and safety to EVOs. Even though the CWD system using electrified roadways and wireless power transfer methods may have a great impact on range anxiety of EVOs, until then development of current CI is required to encourage drivers to switch to EVs.…”

Dynamic charging systems for electric vehicles: simulation for the daily energy estimation on motorways

“…The effect on the quality of the CWD service can be observed in Table 6, in which the average delay to charge reaches 91 s in the peak period (18)(19) h) at node 9. Considering that the free flow speed for 'charge' vehicles in the CWD lane is equal to 60 km/h, the estimated delay implies a 150% travel time increase.…”

“…This paragraph synthetises the adopted traffic model and describes the modifications introduced to face the considered problem. Further details about the traffic model can be found in [19], as well as its relevant parameters.…”

“…The traffic simulator has been implemented using Visual Basic programming language. The algorithm generates an initial traffic state, consisting of a set of vehicles with a starting SOC, and then it iteratively analyses their arrival time and energy parameters node-by-node, according to the process described in [19].…”

“Charge while driving” for electric vehicles: road traffic modeling and energy assessment

“…The traffic simulator has been implemented in Microsoft Excel platform using Visual Basic programming language, and more details on the model can be found in [13].…”