A Hybrid Multi-Objective Chicken Swarm Optimization and Teaching Learning Based Algorithm for Charging Station Placement Problem

A new hybrid multi-objective evolutionary algorithm is developed and deployed in the present work for the optimal allocation of Electric Vehicle (EV) charging stations. The charging stations must be positioned on the road in such a way that they are easily accessible to the EV drivers and the electric power grid is not overloaded. The optimization framework aims at simultaneously reducing the cost, guaranteeing sufficient grid stability and feasible charging station accessibility. The grid stability is measured by a composite index consisting of Voltage stability, Reliability, and Power loss (VRP index). A Pareto dominance based hybrid Chicken Swarm Optimization and Teaching Learning Based Optimization (CSO TLBO) algorithm is utilized to obtain the Pareto optimal solution. It amalgamates swarm intelligence with teaching-learning process and inherits the strengths of CSO and TLBO. The two level algorithm has been validated on the multi-objective benchmark problems as well as EV charging station placement. The performance of the Pareto dominance based CSO TLBO is compared with that of other state-of-the-art algorithms. Furthermore, a fuzzy decision making is used to extract the best solution from the non dominated set of solutions. The combination of CSO and TLBO can yield promising results, which is found to be efficient in dealing with the practical charging station placement problem.