Abstract

The increasingly widespread use of vehicles has intensified fuel consumption and hence the emission of air pollutants, causing a negative environmental impact on both human health and climate change. It is well known that vehicle fuel consumption depends on several factors such as engine and vehicle technology, road characteristics, traffic conditions, and driver ability. Although the relationship between these variables has been subject of several researches, the combined influence of traffic flow with road type on vehicle fuel consumption has not yet been studied in depth. This paper aims to fill this gap by processing a large dataset of real-world driving data from an experiment carried out in Madrid, Spain; and to develop and validate a new approach using cluster analysis to define real traffic conditions. The results indicate that poor traffic conditions can significantly reduce vehicle’s energy efficiency and influence driving behavior, rather drastically depending on the road typology. While on high-capacity roads the speed covariance increases up to 73% in congestion, on low-capacity roads it increases by 31%, since road geometry also covers an important role; indeed, due to their complex and segmented geometry, local streets show 37% less vehicle’s energy efficiency compared with highways. The outcomes of this study suggest that energy efficiency depends on avoiding congestion on high-capacity roads, selecting green itineraries using the right road sections and having a more homogeneous driving behavior on low-capacity roads, through eco-driving whenever possible.

摘要

车辆的日益广泛使用增加了燃料消耗，从而增加了空气污染物的排放，对人类健康和气候变化造成了不利的环境影响。众所周知，车辆油耗取决于几个因素，例如发动机和车辆技术，道路特性，交通状况和驾驶员能力。尽管这些变量之间的关系已成为若干研究的主题，但尚未深入研究交通流量与道路类型对车辆燃油消耗的综合影响。本文旨在通过处理来自西班牙马德里的一项实验的大型现实驾驶数据集来填补这一空白。并使用聚类分析开发和验证一种新方法来定义实际交通状况。结果表明，不良的交通状况会极大地降低车辆的能源效率并影响驾驶行为，而这很大程度上取决于道路类型。在大容量道路上，拥堵时速度协方差增加高达73％，而在低容量道路上，速度协方差增加31％，这是因为道路几何形状也起着重要作用。实际上，由于其复杂且分段的几何形状，与高速公路相比，当地街道的车辆能源效率降低了37％。这项研究的结果表明，能源效率取决于避免大容量道路上的拥堵，使用正确的路段选择绿色路线以及在低容量道路上通过尽可能的生态驾驶来实现更均匀的驾驶行为。