Review: Multi-Robot Task Allocation With Battery Management Constraints In Intralogistics

This paper reviews the current state of literature for controlling automated guided vehicles (AGVs) and autonomous mobile robots (AMRs) in a factory considering battery management (BM). The optimal allocation of tasks to a fleet of mobile robots known as multi-robot task allocation (MRTA) problem is one of the major problem classes covered in research. The limited capacity of the mobile power source and necessary charging or battery swapping operations are often neglected. This effectively limits the availability of the individual vehicles. If a high number of vehicles are charging at the same time in a state of high demand this will have a significant impact on the performance of the whole transport system. The impact of charging can effectively be eliminated by increasing vehicle count. In practise this often results in over dimensioned systems rather than focussing on a more sophisticated BM strategy. For economic and sustainability reasons this cannot be considered a good approach.