Energy Consumption Model of Aerial Urban Logistic Infrastructures

Giuseppe Aiello, Rosalinda Inguanta, Giusj D’Angelo and Mario Venticinque
Additional contact information
Giuseppe Aiello: Department of Engineering, University of Palermo, 90133 Palermo, Italy
Rosalinda Inguanta: Department of Engineering, University of Palermo, 90133 Palermo, Italy
Giusj D’Angelo: Department of Engineering, University of Palermo, 90133 Palermo, Italy
Mario Venticinque: National Council of Research, Istituto per i Sistemi Agricoli e Forestali del Mediterraneo (ISAFoM), 80055 Catania, Italy

Energies, 2021, vol. 14, issue 18, 1-19

Abstract: In the last decade, logistic systems based on small aerial vehicles (drones) have become attractive for urban delivery operations as a sustainable alternative to ground vehicles because they are not affected by the congestion of the road network, thus allowing for faster and more reliable services. Aerial logistic systems, however, require a substantially different approach to operations management and need specifically designed supportive infrastructures. While the research on urban aerial delivery mostly focuses on the optimization vehicle operations, the appropriate design of supportive infrastructures is seldom considered. This paper focuses on the energy efficiency of aerial logistic systems, and proposes a new original methodology to obtain a realistic estimate of the overall energy consumed by a swarm of drones employed for urban delivery, taking into account the extension of the area served and its specific features. The methodology proposed offers relevant information for the decision problems related to the appropriate sizing of the infrastructures, the dimensioning of the swarm of drones and the capacity of the energy storage system. The paper also reports a comparison with ground vehicles in the same scenarios, showing the relevant tradeoffs. The results obtained demonstrate how an appropriate design of the supportive infrastructures for urban aerial logistics may significantly impact the overall efficiency of the delivery system.

Keywords: city logistics; energy optimization; distribution systems; Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q Q0 Q4 Q40 Q41 Q42 Q43 Q47 Q48 Q49 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/14/18/5998/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/14/18/5998/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jeners:v:14:y:2021:i:18:p:5998-:d:640132

Access Statistics for this article

Energies is currently edited by Ms. Agatha Cao

More articles in Energies from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().