Sustainable road network design considering hydrogen fuel cell vehicles

Abstract

Environmental pollution and energy shortages have brought about an increased focus on new energy vehicles. Hydrogen fuel cell vehicles (HFCVs) have experienced rapid development due to the potential to alleviate energy pressures and reduce pollution emissions. Near zero-carbon emissions offer a promising avenue for promoting sustainable transportation development. To evaluate the impact of HFCVs on the transportation environment, this paper investigates the problem of sustainable transportation network design including HFCVs. Specifically, the problem is formulated as a bi-level multi-objective programming problem, with the upper level aimed at determining the optimal network design scheme considering multiple objectives, while the lower level addresses the mixed traffic flow that comprises both HFCVs and fuel vehicles. To solve the multi-objective sustainable network design problem, an integrated solution framework that combines the particle swarm optimization (PSO) algorithm with the Frank-Wolfe algorithm (FW) is developed. Specifically, the PSO algorithm is utilized to solve the upper-level model and identify the optimal network design schemes, while FW algorithm is adopted to handle mixed traffic flow assignments. Finally, the proposed model and algorithm are implemented in two numerical experiment to demonstrate their effectiveness and efficiency.