Bi-objective-optimisation of an international transportation problem for CO2-efficient schedules

The transportation sector accounts for a considerable portion of global CO2 emissions and the demand for transport, especially for international transport, is increasing. Current approaches to reduce CO2 emission on an operational level ignore time-related objectives and focus on simultaneous optimisation of economic and ecological objectives. In general, considering the minimisation of CO2 emissions in transportation scheduling introduces a trade-off between economic and ecological concerns. The concept of eco-efficiency is important in order to evaluate the economical value and ecological quality of business decisions. Nevertheless, this concept has primarily been applied to strategic decisions. In the present paper we demonstrate the applicability of this concept to operative decisions and introduce a bi-objective evolutionary optimisation approach for the approximation of CO2-efficient schedules in an international transportation problem.