Impact of electric vehicle subsidies on a mixed urban delivery fleet

초록

Electric vehicles (EVs) play an important role in reducing carbon emissions for logistics companies. This study examines three types of government subsidy policies for EVs: (1) vehicle purchase subsidy (PS); (2) fleet electrification subsidy (FS); and (3) mileage subsidy (MS). For each subsidy policy, a bi-objective optimization model is proposed to minimize the fleet cost and carbon emissions. The model considers the en-route charging decisions of EVs and carbon emissions of internal combustion engine vehicles (ICEVs). This study reveals that among the three policies (i.e., PS, FS, and MS), the policy resulting in the largest number of EVs in the fleet can maximize social welfare only when the per-vehicle environmental impact of EV production is low; When the impact is high, the greatest social welfare could be achieved under the policy yielding the fewest EVs. Varying individual policies has divergent effects: increasing the PS or FS can enhance fleet electrification and reduce emissions, whereas increasing the MS may primarily boost the average EV mileage. Comparing the same total subsidy level and using the PS as a benchmark, both the FS and MS policies can enhance fleet electrification and reduce emissions, but their limitations differ: the MS policy's environmental benefits may diminish at high subsidy levels, whereas the FS policy may raise the total fleet cost. Any of the three policies can achieve the lowest total fleet cost, highlighting the need to tailor subsidy choice to a specific objective.

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