Analyzing the Impact of Vehicle Speed on Distribution Cost for Cold Chain Logistics

Abstract

The cold chain logistics industry has a promising prospect, while high costs impede its development. In order to reduce cost pressure on cold chain logistics, this paper investigates the impact of vehicle speed on distribution cost for cold chain logistics. Firstly, a mathematical model with which to minimize the total cost is constructed. The sub-costs consist of fixed costs, fuel costs, refrigeration costs and damage costs. Secondly, an actual case data is used to conduct the experiments. Through experiments, it is demonstrated that optimizing vehicle speed can greatly reduce the total cost of the cold chain logistics. We also find that there is a reasonable speed range where the total cost changes slightly. Furthermore, this paper also discussed the impacts of spoilage rate and unit refrigeration cost on optimal speed and the reasonable speed range. The results show that as spoilage rate and unit refrigeration cost increase, both the optimal speed and the reasonable speed range will firstly increase and then stabilize. Finally, some managerial implications based on our findings were also presented targeting enterprises and the government.