Vehicle dispatching system and vehicle dispatching method

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-11052780-B2
Application number	US-201816112869-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Aug 27, 2018
Priority date	Oct 27, 2017
Publication date	Jul 6, 2021
Grant date	Jul 6, 2021

Abstract

The vehicle dispatching system accepts a dispatch request from a user, selects an autonomous vehicle matching with the dispatch request from among a plurality of autonomous vehicles, and dispatches a selected autonomous vehicle to the user. The plurality of autonomous vehicles include a plurality of battery-mounted vehicles having an in-vehicle battery capable of being charged externally as an energy source. Each of the plurality of battery-mounted vehicles performs charging at a charging station when a charging level of the in-vehicle battery decreases. The vehicle dispatching system comprises a management server including a processor for executing programs stored in memory, the management server programmed to act as a charging planning unit that changes an upper limit charging level of the in-vehicle battery when charging at the charging station according to a time slot.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A vehicle dispatching system comprising:
a processor and a memory programmed to:
accept a dispatch request from a plurality of users;
select an autonomous vehicle matching with the dispatch request from among a plurality of autonomous vehicles,
wherein the plurality of autonomous vehicles include a plurality of battery-mounted vehicles having an in-vehicle battery capable of being charged externally as an energy source, and
wherein the plurality of battery-mounted vehicles include (i) electric vehicles having the in-vehicle battery as an only energy source and (ii) plug-in hybrid vehicles having the in-vehicle battery and an energy source other than the in-vehicle battery,
wherein each of the plurality of battery-mounted vehicles performs charging at a charging station when a charging level of the in-vehicle battery decreases;

lower an upper limit charging level of the in-vehicle battery of the battery-mounted vehicles when charging at the charging station in a time slot that is predicted to have a large proportion of short-distance users;
raise the upper limit charging level of the in-vehicle battery of the battery-mounted vehicles when charging at the charging station in a time slot that is predicted to have a large proportion of long-distance users,
dispatch an electric vehicle preferentially to a short-distance user, and dispatch a plug-in hybrid vehicle to a long-distance user, in the time slot that is predicted to have a large proportion of short-distance users, when ride distance information is included in the dispatch request.

2. The vehicle dispatching system according to claim 1 ,
wherein the processor dispatches an electric vehicle in the time slot that is predicted to have a large proportion of short-distance users, when the ride distance information is not included in the dispatch request.

3. A vehicle dispatching system comprising:
a processor and a memory programmed to:
accept a dispatch request from a plurality of users;
select an autonomous vehicle matching with the dispatch request from among a plurality of autonomous vehicles,
wherein the plurality of autonomous vehicles include a plurality of battery-mounted vehicles having an in-vehicle battery capable of being charged externally as an energy source, and
wherein the plurality of battery-mounted vehicles include (i) electric vehicles having the in-vehicle battery as an only energy source and (ii) plug-in hybrid vehicles having the in-vehicle battery and an energy source other than the in-vehicle battery,
wherein each of the plurality of battery-mounted vehicles performs charging at a charging station when a charging level of the in-vehicle battery decreases;

lower an upper limit charging level of the in-vehicle battery of the battery-mounted vehicles when charging at the charging station in a time slot that is predicted to have a large proportion of short-distance users;
raise the upper limit charging level of the in-vehicle battery of the battery-mounted vehicles when charging at the charging station in a time slot that is predicted to have a large proportion of long-distance users; and
dispatch an electric vehicle charged with a low upper limit charging level preferentially to a short-distance user, and
dispatch an electric vehicle charged with a high upper limit charging level or a plug-in hybrid vehicle to a long-distance user, in the time slot that is predicted to have a large proportion of short-distance users, when ride distance information is included in the dispatch request.

4. The vehicle dispatching system according to claim 2 ,
wherein the processor dispatches an electric vehicle charged with a high upper limit charging level preferentially to a long-distance user when a ride distance of the user is shorter than a travelable distance by the in-vehicle battery, and dispatches a plug-in hybrid vehicle to the long-distance user when the ride distance of the user is longer than the travelable distance by the in-vehicle battery.

5. The vehicle dispatching system according to claim 3 ,
wherein the processor dispatches an electric vehicle charged with a low upper limit charging level in the time slot that is predicted to have a large proportion of short-distance users, when the ride distance information is not included in the dispatch request.

6. A vehicle dispatching method that accepts a dispatch request from a user, selects an autonomous vehicle matching with the dispatch request from among a plurality of autonomous vehicles, and dispatches a selected autonomous vehicle to the user, the vehicle dispatching method comprising:
preparing, as a part of the plurality of autonomous vehicles, a plurality of battery-mounted vehicles having an in-vehicle battery capable of being charged externally as an energy source, wherein the plurality of battery-mounted vehicles include (i) electric vehicles having the in-vehicle battery as an only energy source and (ii) plug-in hybrid vehicles having the in-vehicle battery and an energy source other than the in-vehicle battery;
performing charging with respect to each of the plurality of battery-mounted vehicles at a charging station when a charging level of the in-vehicle battery decreases;
lowering an upper limit charging level of the in-vehicle battery of the battery-mounted vehicles when charging at the charging station in a time slot that is predicted to have a large proportion of short-distance users;
raising the upper charging level of the in-vehicle battery of the battery-mounted vehicles when charging at the charging station in a time slot that is predicted to have a large proportion of long-distance users
dispatching an electric vehicle preferentially to a short-distance user, and dispatching a plug-in hybrid vehicle to a long-distance user, in the time slot that is predicted to have a large proportion of short-distance users, when ride distance information is included in the dispatch request.

Assignees

• Toyota Motor Co Ltd

Inventors

• Taguchi Koji
• Morita Makoto

Classifications

• G06Q10/0631 Primary

  Resource planning, allocation, distributing or scheduling for enterprises or organisations · CPC title

• B60L53/14

  Conductive energy transfer · CPC title

• B60L53/36 Primary

  by positioning the vehicle · CPC title

• Y02T90/14

  Plug-in electric vehicles · CPC title

• Y02T10/70

  Energy storage systems for electromobility, e.g. batteries · CPC title