A hybrid FJA-ALNS algorithm for solving the multi-compartment vehicle routing problem with a heterogeneous fleet of vehicles for the fuel delivery problem

Abstract

This paper proposes a new hybrid algorithm to solve the multi-compartment vehicle routing problem (MCVRP) with a heterogeneous fleet of vehicles for the fuel delivery problem of a previous study of twenty petrol stations in northeastern Thailand. The proposed heuristic is called the Fisher and Jaikumar Algorithm with Adaptive Large Neighborhood Search (FJA-ALNS algorithm). The objective of this case is to minimize the total distance, while using a minimum number of multi-compartment vehicles. In the first phase, we used the FJA to solve the MCVRP for the fuel delivery problem. The results from solving the FJA were utilized to be the initial solutions in the second phase. In the second phase, a hybrid algorithm, namely the FJA-ALNS algorithm, has been developed to improve the initial solutions of the individual FJA. The results from the FJA-ALNS algorithm are compared with the exact method (LINGO software), individual FJA and individual ALNS. For small-sized problems (N=5), the results of the proposed FJA-ALNS and all methods provided no different results from the global optimal solution, but the proposed FJA-ALNS algorithm required less computational time. For larger-sized problems, LINGO software could not find the optimal solution within the limited period of computational time, while the FJA-ALNS algorithm provided better results with much less computational time. In solving the four numerical examples using the FJA-ALNS algorithm, the result shows that the proposed FJA-ALNS algorithm is effective for solving the MCVRP in this case. Undoubtedly, future work can apply the proposed FJA-ALNS algorithm to other practical cases and other variants of the VRP in real-world situations.