Optimal control of connected and automated vehicles at highway on-ramps to reduce vehicles fuel consumption and increase passenger comfort

In recent years, a number of optimized control methods for connected and automated vehicles (CAVs) have been published. These methods reduce fuel consumption, increase safety and passenger comfort, and improve traffic flow by controlling the speed, acceleration, and jerk of vehicles. In this paper, the problem of optimal control of vehicles in on-ramps based on the minimization of a non-negative weighted sum of the acceleration and jerk using the Hamiltonian analysis is investigated to significantly reduce fuel consumption. The performance of the proposed algorithm is evaluated in comparison with the two conventional optimal control of acceleration, jerk, and baseline scenario through six different case studies. Simulation results using MATLAB/Simulink software illustrate that the weighted optimization function can effectively reduce fuel consumption in comparison with the baseline scenario. The results of the case studies indicate that in each case study, vehicles fuel consumption for passing through the control zone is reduced from 5 to 51% relative to the baseline scenario.