Toward Real-Time Pricing and Allocation for Surplus Resources in Electric Bus Charging Stations

We are witnessing a rapid growth of electric vehicles in both individual and public transportation. Many large-scale company-built electric bus charging stations have been established to facilitate public transportation, while these electric bus charging stations are not accessible to private vehicles. The motivation for this work comes from the possibility of opening surplus resources in electric bus charging stations to alleviate the charging resource shortage and gain extra profit for the electric bus charging station. The operation facing private vehicles, however, also encounters obstacles including serious congestion induced by absorbing private vehicles and delays of bus lines due to private vehicles occupying charging points. To jointly solve these challenges, we propose a real-time control mechanism to maximize the long-term net profit of an electric bus charging station based on Lyapunov optimization theory and generalized benders decomposition, while maintaining the congestion level and ensuring timetables of buses. We demonstrate through rigorous theoretical proof that the proposed mechanism can be arbitrarily close to the optimal solution. Comprehensive evaluation experiments with real-world data sets have been conducted to show the credibility of the mechanism in reducing congestion, ensuring bus timetables, and maximizing the long-term net profit.