Sustainability Analysis of Autonomous Vehicle Storage and Retrieval Systems

In the last years, huge efforts have been performed in developing innovative solutions to support warehouses automation. Although a variety of approaches addressed the performance evaluation of storage and retrieval systems, e.g., cycle time and machine utilization, no contribution has highlighted the sustainability of this class of systems yet. The aim of this work is to propose a methodology to allow the evaluation of energy consumption of such systems, with particular concern for Autonomous Vehicle Storage and Retrieval Systems (AVS/RS); such evaluation is supported by the design and execution of a simulation model representing the warehouse behaviour under different scenarios. The application of the approach in a real warehouse is also presented. Key-Words: AVS/RS, discrete event simulation, autonomous vehicles, shuttle-based systems, manufacturing systems, automatic warehouse, UML activity diagrams.