Optimizing Electrical Vehicle Charging Infrastructure: A Congestion Game Approach to Pricing and Placement

We propose an optimal pricing method for multiple charging stations within a congestion game framework. We compute the equilibrium flows for each pricing strategy and select the prices that maximize the operator’s revenue. The demand at each station is influenced by travel times and incentives to charge. Vehicle types and behaviors (thermal vs. electric, must/may/not charge) are considered. This results in a bi-level optimization problem, which is solved using a Branch-And-Bound approach enhanced with pruning techniques for improved efficiency. Our experiment integrates three levels of optimization: maximizing revenue by optimizing the placement of stations when maximizing their pricing strategies, while minimizing the demand derived from the congestion game model. We examine the total travel time and maximizing revenue does not increase congestion.