Improved Set Covering Location Model for Charging Facility Deployments

摘要

While electric vehicles (EVs) can assist in resolving environmental pollution and resource scarcity problems, they require specific infrastructure developments. Destination chargers, which are based on current charging technologies and EV characteristics, have been the main charging facilities employed. Using an Improved Set Covering Location Model (ISCLM), the primary objective of this paper is to determine how destination chargers could be deployed in urban areas. As the model basis, the purpose, time, and parking conditions of urban car-use behaviors are first analyzed, based on which the ISCLM is constructed. As the basic Set Covering Location Model (SCLM) is an NP-hard problem, improvements in the assumptions and solution algorithms are made so that the ISCLM treats all demand points as equivalent regardless of the internal sizes. As it is also assumed that the service range for all charging stations is circular and have the same radius, the ISCLM is a polynomial problem; therefore, the Minimum Covering Circle algorithm and the Voronoi Graph are used to derive the destination charger deployment solution. To verify the effectiveness of the ISCLM, the model is used to analyze a specific area in Beijing. In this case study, the simulated demand points were selected based on the location of actual parking lots in residential communities and office buildings. The results validated the enhancement in the ISCLM network architecture.