Validation of EcoRouting and an Analysis of the Impact of Traffic on Route Choice

Abstract

Battery Electric Vehicles and Plug-in Hybrid Vehicles are increasingly becoming more popular in recent years. Stricter regulations from government agencies to curb emissions and reduce impact on climate have led to automobile makers adopt electric powertrains. Eco-Routing is one such method to reduce energy usage in personal transport.

EcoRouting is a methodology that determines the route with the least energy consumption between two points. Standard navigation systems often determine the shortest or the fastest route, emphasizing travel time. EcoRouting considers an alternative criterion - energy consumption. In this thesis, an automation methodology is presented that determines the EcoRoute among given route alternatives based on route distance, speed limits, road grades, traffic signs, driver aggression and the powertrain.

There are three major objectives in this thesis: Developing the automation methodology for the determination of EcoRoute for use in on-board applications, validating the EcoRouting methodology on actual driving conditions and studying the impact of traffic on the choice of EcoRoute.

The automation methodology has been developed on the Android framework for use with on-board applications on Android mobile devices. The automation methodology used to conduct sensitivity studies show that factors such as driver aggression, distance and conditional stops impact energy consumption. The comparison of results of simulation using the automation methodology against results from actual driving to validate the methodology on actual driving conditions show that transient traffic conditions can have significant impact on energy consumption. Finally, route energy consumptions for various traffic conditions are estimated using simulation to understand the impact of traffic on energy consumption and EcoRoute choice. Results that are obtained show that apart from traffic affecting the energy consumption, travel times can have an impact on choice of EcoRoute.