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Energy Saving in Traffic Infrastructure

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A special issue of Energies (ISSN 1996-1073). This special issue belongs to the section "A: Sustainable Energy".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (25 August 2023) | Viewed by 9479

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Special Issue Editors

Prof. Dr. Qiang Tang

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Guest Editor

School of Rail Transportation, Soochow University, Suzhou 215131, China
Interests: municipal solid waste disposal; environmentally friendly construction materials; geotechnical engineering
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Dr. Wei Liu

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Guest Editor

School of Rail Transportation, Soochow University, Suzhou 215131, China
Interests: urban underground engineering; shield tunneling engineering; geotechnical engineering; numerical calculations
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Dr. Yucheng Huang

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Guest Editor

School of Rail Transportation, Soochow University, Suzhou 215131, China
Interests: road engineering; green recycled road materials; geotechnical engineering

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

The construction and maintenance of roads, railways, bridges, tunnels, terminals, ports, and airports and the provision of lighting and signaling equipment require a substantial amount of energy. Notwithstanding the enormous efforts of academic researchers and those within the industry, solutions for mitigating energy consumption during the construction and maintenance of traffic infrastructures remain to be found. Therefore, new materials and strategies for reducing the energy cost are urgently needed. This Special Issue plans to present an overview of the most recent advances in energy saving applications in the field of traffic infrastructure. This Special Issue is aimed at providing selected contributions on advances in the synthesis, characterization, and applications of green materials, new strategies, and innovative designs of the traffic infrastructure for energy saving. Potential topics include but are not limited to:

alternative materials for energy saving;
environmental methods in construction and maintenance;
energy harvesting in traffic infrastructure;
innovative designs or strategies to reduce energy consumption;
renewable energy in traffic infrastructure;
energy efficiency improvement in traffic infrastructure;
thermoelectric generators;
reducing carbon emissions in traffic infrastructure.

Prof. Dr. Qiang Tang
Dr. Wei Liu
Dr. Yucheng Huang
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

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Keywords

energy saving
energy harvesting
green materials
innovative design
new strategies

Published Papers (5 papers)

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Research

31 pages, 15533 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Modeling and Analyzing the Impact of Different Operating Conditions for Electric and Conventional Vehicles in Malaysia on Energy, Economic, and the Environment

by Nur Ayeesha Qisteena Muzir, Md. Hasanuzzaman and Jeyraj Selvaraj

Energies 2023, 16(13), 5048; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/en16135048 - 29 Jun 2023

Cited by 1 | Viewed by 1384

Abstract

Given the significance of the transportation sector to the economy of a country, major companies and government-linked entities have invested in infrastructure and transportation services. Nonetheless, the sector faces issues relating to traffic congestion, energy consumption, and environmental impacts such as air pollution and carbon emissions. To address and analyze these issues, the current study employed microscopic modeling using the AIMSUN software, which allowed for detailed modeling and simulation. The current study examined the impacts of different operating conditions, namely: internal combustion engine vehicles (ICEVs) and electric vehicles (EVs), on energy consumption, energy savings, cost savings, and emissions traveling on a total of six (6) routes: (i) long-distance highway travel, (ii) short-distance highway travel, (iii) long-distance urban travel, (iv) short-distance urban travel, (v) long-distance suburban travel, and (vi) short-distance suburban travel. The impacts of the traffic management systems, such as traffic lights, roundabouts, and road altitude, were also analyzed in this research. The current study discovered that, on average, EVs consumed 30 percent less energy than ICEVs and a 26 percent energy cost saving for long-distance highway travel. On long-distance urban travel, EVs experienced higher energy and cost savings than ICEVs, with 86 percent and 64 percent, respectively. In addition, EVs had lower carbon dioxide emissions than ICEVs. This study concludes that EVs offer positive impacts on energy cost savings and carbon dioxide emissions reduction for all six (6) simulated routes in Malaysia compared to ICEVs, thereby contributing to the existing literature on EVs in Malaysia. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Energy Saving in Traffic Infrastructure)

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16 pages, 2589 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Design of Electric Bus Transit Routes with Charging Stations under Demand Uncertainty

by Xiaoqing Su, Lanqing Jiang and Yucheng Huang

Energies 2023, 16(4), 1848; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/en16041848 - 13 Feb 2023

Viewed by 1441

Abstract

This paper investigates the design problem of an electric bus (E-bus) route with charging stations to smooth the operations between E-bus service and charging. The design variables include the locations of E-bus stops, number of charging piles at charging stations, fare, and headway. A mathematical programming model is proposed to maximize social welfare in consideration of the uncertain charging demand at charging stations. The model solution algorithm is also designed. The model and algorithm are demonstrated on the E-bus route 931 in the city of Suzhou, China. The results of the case studies show that (i) the right number of stops on a bus route can contribute to the highest social welfare; (ii) the pile–bus ratio decreases with the increase of E-bus fleet size, thereby improving the E-bus charging efficiency at charging stations; and (iii) deploying charging stations at one end of a bus route can achieve a shorter waiting time for E-bus compared with deployment at two ends. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Energy Saving in Traffic Infrastructure)

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15 pages, 1180 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Chemical Damage Constitutive Model Establishment and the Energy Analysis of Rocks under Water–Rock Interaction

by Qi Xu, Angran Tian, Xinyu Luo, Xin Liao and Qiang Tang

Energies 2022, 15(24), 9386; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/en15249386 - 12 Dec 2022

Cited by 6 | Viewed by 1103

Abstract

The physical and mechanical properties of rocks can be reduced significantly by an acidic environment, resulting in engineering weaknesses, such as building foundation instability, landslides, etc. In order to investigate the mechanical properties of rocks after hydrochemical erosion, a chemical damage constitutive model was established and used to analyze chemical damage variables and energy transformation. It is assumed that the strength of the rock elements obeyed Weibull distribution, considering the nonuniformity of rock. The chemical damage variable was proposed according to the load-bearing volume changes in the rock under water–rock chemical interactions. The chemical damage constitutive model was derived from coupling the mechanical damage under the external load and the chemical damage under hydrochemical erosion. In order to verify the accuracy of the model, semi-immersion experiments and uniaxial compression experiments of black sandy dolomite were carried out with different iron ion concentrations. Compared with the experimental data, the chemical damage constitutive model proposed could predict the stress–strain relationship reasonably well after water–rock interaction. The effects of water–rock interaction on the rock were a decrease in peak stress and an increase in peak strain. The peak strain increased by 4.96–29.58%, and the deterioration rate of peak strength was 0.19–4.18%. The energy transformation of the deterioration process was analyzed, and the results showed that the decrease in releasable elastic energy, U_e, is converted into dissipated energy, U_d, after hydrochemical erosion. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Energy Saving in Traffic Infrastructure)

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25 pages, 4284 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Electric Vehicle Routing Problem with Simultaneous Pickup and Delivery: Mathematical Modeling and Adaptive Large Neighborhood Search Heuristic Method

by Wei Xu, Chenghao Zhang, Ming Cheng and Yucheng Huang

Energies 2022, 15(23), 9222; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/en15239222 - 5 Dec 2022

Cited by 7 | Viewed by 1720

Abstract

Electric vehicles (EVs) are a promising option to reduce air pollution and shipping costs, especially in urban areas. To provide scientific guidance for the growing number of logistics companies using EVs, we investigated an electric-vehicle-routing problem with simultaneous pickup and delivery that also considers non-linear charging and load-dependent discharging (EVRPSPD-NL-LD). The objective was to minimize the total number of EVs and the total working time, including travel time, charging time, waiting time, and service time. We formulated the problem as a mixed integer linear program (MILP), and small-size problems could be solved to optimality in an acceptable amount of time using the commercial solver IBM ILOG CPLEX Optimization Studio (CPLEX). In view of the fact that the problem is NP-hard, an adaptive large neighborhood search (ALNS) metaheuristic method was proposed to solve large-size problems. Meanwhile, new operators and a time priority approach were developed to provide options for different scenarios. The results of our computational investigation and sensitivity analysis showed that the proposed methods are effective and efficient for modified benchmark instances. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Energy Saving in Traffic Infrastructure)

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18 pages, 5582 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Factors Affecting Soybean Crude Urease Extraction and Biocementation via Enzyme-Induced Carbonate Precipitation (EICP) for Soil Improvement

by Shuang Shu, Boyang Yan, Bin Ge, Shiling Li and Hao Meng

Energies 2022, 15(15), 5566; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/en15155566 - 31 Jul 2022

Cited by 26 | Viewed by 2999

Abstract

Enzyme-induced carbonate precipitation (EICP) is a new biogeotechnical ground improvement technique that uses calcium carbonate (CaCO₃) formed by biochemical processes to increase soil strength and stiffness. In this paper, crude urease extracted from soybeans was employed to catalyze the precipitation of CaCO₃ in sand. To optimize the urease extraction efficiency, factors affecting the soybean crude urease extraction, including the powdered soybean particle size, concentration, soaking time, and soaking temperature, were addressed. This paper also provided further insight regarding the impact of the urease activity of soybean crude extract on the chemical conversion efficiency and the biocementation performance in EICP. The findings revealed that the powdered soybean concentration and the particle size were the two most important factors affecting the urease activity of the soybean crude extract. The enzyme activity utilized in the EICP process might further lead to different reactant efficiencies of urea-CaCl₂ solution, and consequently, the improvement in the physical and mechanical properties of biocemented sand. Considering the chemical conversion efficiency and the biocementation performance, 60 g/L of powdered soybean was concluded as the preferred quantity for extracting the crude urease, with an enzyme activity of 6.62 mM urea min⁻¹. Under this condition, a chemical conversion efficiency of approximately 95% for 0.5 M urea-0.5 M CaCl₂ could be obtained in merely 12 h, and the unconfined compressive strength (UCS) of the EICP-treated sand exceeded 4 MPa with a CaCO₃ content of ~8%. As a high-efficient cost-effective alternative to the purified enzyme for carbonate precipitation, the soybean crude urease showed great potential for ground improvement. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Energy Saving in Traffic Infrastructure)

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