A Multi-Criteria Approach for Optimizing the Placement of Electric Vehicle Charging Stations in Highways

The electric vehicle (EV) industry has made significant progress but, in many markets, there are still barriers holding back its advancement. A key issue is the anxiety caused to the drivers by the limited range of current EV models and the inadequate access to charging stations in long-distance trips, as is the case on highways. We propose an intuitive multi-criteria approach that optimally places EV charging stations on highways that (partially) lack such points. The approach, which is applied in an iterative fashion to dynamically evaluate the alternatives, considers a set of practical criteria related to the traffic intensity and the relative location of the charging stations with interchanges, major cities, and existing stations, thus supporting decisions in a pragmatic way. The optimal locations are determined by taking into consideration constraints about the EV driving range and installation preferences to improve the operation of the highway while ensuring reasonable cost of investment. The proposed approach is showcased in the Egnatia Motorway, the longest highway in Greece that runs a total of 670 km but currently involves a single EV charging point. Our findings illustrate the utility of the proposed approach and highlight its merits as a decision-support tool.