Coordinated route optimization for heavy-duty vehicle platoons

Heavy-duty vehicles traveling in platoons consume fuel at a reduced rate. In this paper, we attempt to maximize this benefit by introducing local controllers throughout a road network to facilitate platoon formations with minimal information. By knowing a vehicle's position, speed, and destination, the local controller can quickly decide how its speed should be possibly adjusted to platoon with others in the near future. We solve this optimal control and routing problem exactly for small numbers of vehicles, and present a fast heuristic algorithm for real-time use. We then implement such a distributed control system through a large-scale simulation of the German autobahn road network containing thousands of vehicles. The simulation shows fuel savings from 1-9%, with savings exceeding 5% when only a few thousand vehicles participate in the system. We assume no vehicles will travel more than the time required for their shortest paths for the majority of the paper. We conclude the results by analyzing how a relaxation of this assumption can further reduce fuel use.