Energy-Efficient Resilience Scheduling for Elevator Group Control via Queueing-Based Planning and Safe Reinforcement Learning

High-rise elevator group control systems operate under pronounced nonstationarity during commuting peaks, post-event surges, and capacity degradation, where the waiting time distribution becomes right-tail heavy and stresses service-level agreements (SLAs) defined by coverage and high-quantile targets. At the same time, the time-of-use tariffs and carbon constraints sharpen the tension between peak-power control, energy savings, and service capacity. This paper proposes a two-layer resilience scheduling framework that integrates queueing-based planning with safe reinforcement learning (RL) fine-tuning. In the planning layer, parsimonious queueing approximations and scenario-based evaluation construct a finite set of implementable mode cards and emergency switching cards; Sample Average Approximation (SAA) combined with Conditional Value-at-Risk (CVaR) constraints filter candidates to enforce tail-risk-aware service limits while keeping power demand within a prescribed envelope. In the execution layer, online dispatch is formulated as a constrained Markov decision process; within the planning layer limits, action masking and Lagrangian safe RL learn small adaptive adjustments to suppress tail-waiting risk and improve recovery dynamics without increasing peak-power commitments. The experiments under morning peaks and post-event surges confirm tail risk reduction and accelerated recovery. For partial outages, the framework prioritizes SLA coverage and recovery speed, accepting a bounded increase in tail risk as a manageable trade-off. Throughout all tests, peak power remains within the prescribed limits. Improvements persist across random seeds and demand fluctuations, indicating distributional robustness and cross-scenario generalization. Ablation studies further reveal complementary roles: removing the planning layer CVaR screening worsens tail performance, while removing the execution layer action masking increases constraint violations and destabilizes recovery.

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Publication Details

Journal
Machines
Published
2026-03-21
DOI
https://doi.org/10.3390/machines14030352
Primary Topic
Elevator Systems and Control
Type
article
Field-Weighted Citation Impact
0.00
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article

Energy-Efficient Resilience Scheduling for Elevator Group Control via Queueing-Based Planning and Safe Reinforcement Learning

Hao Zou, Chuanjiang Li, Tiantian Zhang, Tingjie Zhang et al.
Machines
Elevator Systems and Control
article

Energy-Efficient Resilience Scheduling for Elevator Group Control via Queueing-Based Planning and Safe Reinforcement Learning

Hao Zou, Chuanjiang Li, Tiantian Zhang, Tingjie Zhang, Jun Huang
article en

Abstract

High-rise elevator group control systems operate under pronounced nonstationarity during commuting peaks, post-event surges, and capacity degradation, where the waiting time distribution becomes right-tail heavy and stresses service-level agreements (SLAs) defined by coverage and high-quantile targets. At the same time, the time-of-use tariffs and carbon constraints sharpen the tension between peak-power control, energy savings, and service capacity. This paper proposes a two-layer resilience scheduling framework that integrates queueing-based planning with safe reinforcement learning (RL) fine-tuning. In the planning layer, parsimonious queueing approximations and scenario-based evaluation construct a finite set of implementable mode cards and emergency switching cards; Sample Average Approximation (SAA) combined with Conditional Value-at-Risk (CVaR) constraints filter candidates to enforce tail-risk-aware service limits while keeping power demand within a prescribed envelope. In the execution layer, online dispatch is formulated as a constrained Markov decision process; within the planning layer limits, action masking and Lagrangian safe RL learn small adaptive adjustments to suppress tail-waiting risk and improve recovery dynamics without increasing peak-power commitments. The experiments under morning peaks and post-event surges confirm tail risk reduction and accelerated recovery. For partial outages, the framework prioritizes SLA coverage and recovery speed, accepting a bounded increase in tail risk as a manageable trade-off. Throughout all tests, peak power remains within the prescribed limits. Improvements persist across random seeds and demand fluctuations, indicating distributional robustness and cross-scenario generalization. Ablation studies further reveal complementary roles: removing the planning layer CVaR screening worsens tail performance, while removing the execution layer action masking increases constraint violations and destabilizes recovery.

MachinesVol. 14(3)
Guizhou University (CN), China Special Equipment Inspection and Research Institute (CN), Neijiang Normal University (CN)
Affordable and clean energy
Openalex Percentile: Top 11%
Elevator Systems and Control
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