Collaboration between carrier companies using truck platooning: an application in the forestry industry

This study explores collaboration between different carrier companies where at least one is equipped with hybrid truck platooning technology (one driver operates a platoon of trucks). Collaboration could help carrier companies share resources and reduce costs. First, a tactical transportation planning problem is formulated as a Mixed-Integer Linear Programming (MILP) model. Using a mix of ordinary and platoon trucks for collaboration, this model aims to minimize transportation costs. The decisions to be made include choosing direct and backhaul routes for both types of trucks in the transportation network and potential terminal nodes to activate. The results show that using truck platooning in collaboration could lead to cost savings ranging between 0.5% and 19% (compared to only using ordinary trucks) depending on the level of collaboration and coverage between the transportation networks of the companies involved. Second, we study the cost-sharing problem to ensure fair cost-saving allocation between the companies. We compare the results of four cost-sharing methods used in a two-step cost allocation process. The first step allocates the cost savings obtained from collaboration using only ordinary trucks. The second step allocates additional cost savings due to platoon trucks. The results show the Shapley value method produces the best allocations.