Heuristic Approaches to Solve E-Scooter Assignment Problem

Abstract

Nowadays, rapid urbanization causes a wide-range of congestion and pollution in megacities worldwide, which bears an urgent need for micromobility solutions such as electric scooters (e-scooter). Many e-scooter firms use freelancers to charge the scooter where they compete to collect and charge the e-scooters at their homes. This competition leads the chargers to travel long distances to collect e-scooters. In this paper, we developed a mixed-integer linear programming (MILP) model for a real-world e-scooter-Chargers Allocation (ESCA) problem. The proposed model allocates the e-scooters to the chargers with an emphasis on minimizing the chargers' average travelled distance to collect the e-scooters. The MILP returns optimal solutions in most cases; however, the ESCA is identified as a generalized assignment problem which classifies as an NP-complete combinatorial optimization problem. Moreover, we modelled the charging problem as a game between two sets of disjoint players, namely e-scooters and chargers. Then we adapted the college admission algorithm (ACA) to solve the ESCA problem. For the sake of comparison, we applied the black hole optimizer (BHO) algorithm to solve this problem using small and medium cases. The experimental results show that the ACA solutions are close to the optimal solutions obtained by the MILP. Furthermore, the BHO solutions are not as good as the ACA solutions, but the ACA solution consumes more time to solve large-scale real cases. Based on the obtained results, we recommend applying the ACA1 to find the near-optimal solution for large-scale instances, as the MILP is inapplicable to find the exact solution in comparison.INDEX TERMS Micromobility modes, e-scooter-chargers allocation, mixed-integer linear programming, heuristic.

A Review on Power Electronics Technologies for Electric Mobility

“…One means of transportation that has also been gaining interest in urban areas is the electric scooter, which is framed in the group of light EVs. This has been implemented in several countries as a vehicle-sharing system, aiming to alleviate the traffic mostly caused by cars [342]. The majority of these electric scooters are not human-assisted, i.e., the power applied to perform the motion comes entirely from the electric machine.…”

Photovoltaic Electric Scooter Charger Dock for the Development of Sustainable Mobility in Urban Environments

“…The transport sector accounts for 24% of global CO2 emissions, 29% of global energy demand, and 65% of the world total oil consumption [1]. Mobility problems are the result of numerous situations, among which the following can be highlighted: deterioration of air quality, mainly in urban areas [2], [3]; deterioration in health and life quality with reference to traffic noise [2]; traffic congestion, with the loss of productive time and its economic repercussion [4], [5], [6]; urban space destined to infrastructure for the circulation and parking of vehicles [4]; limited and expensive parking spaces [2]; long commuting distances that favour the use of the private vehicles; and seasonal concentration of tourism that results in oversized infrastructure. Changes in the transport sector must start in the cities with boosts for e-mobility transport systems powered by renewable electricity [7], [8].…”

“…There is little literature on the use of electric scooters (e-scooter) in urban environments as a new element in micro mobility, but there are studies that show the e-scooter's ability to replace the conventional private vehicles in short urban trajectories [6], [13]. Several reasons explain the increase in the number of e-scooters in cities [8].…”

“…Most of the advantages identified in [16] for e-bikes also are valid for e-scooters. Some common disadvantages of free-floating floats, like the battery recharging and the relocation trips, are analysed in [6], [17].…”

“…The recharging of units offered by means of dockless scooter-sharing services, like those described in [32], is done by crowd-sourcing programs in which the company pays individuals to recharge e-scooters at home, using the conventional electricity provided by the power network [33]. The freelance charger assignment problem during e-scooter collection is analysed in [6]; while the full life-cycle environmental impact of e-scooter sharing services is discussed in [15]. Recharging with an off-board charger connected to the grid also produces air contamination due to the electricity mix used in most countries.…”