Optimal Placement and Capacity of Electric Vehicle Charging Stations in Urban Areas: Survey and Open Challenges

Widespread adoption of electric vehicles (EVs) depend on the optimal placement of charging stations (CSs) in metropolitan areas, as well as the capacity of each charging station. The location of CS should guarantee that EV users can reach the CS within their driving range and also within the battery state of charge (SOC). Many research works have proposed different techniques and approaches to determine the capacity and the optimal placement of CSs in urban areas considering many parameters and constraints, such as EV driver behavior, CS development cost, and power grid loss. The problem of finding the capacity and optimal locations for the CSs is mainly formulated as an optimization problem. Various algorithms have been used in these research papers to solve this problem, such as genetic algorithm (GA), binary lighting search algorithm (BLSA), particle swarm optimizer (PSO). This survey focuses on the solutions that have been proposed in recent research works to solve this problem, and then compare them in terms of the total expected cost, Energy demand, EV user preference, proposed approach, research objectives, metrics and constraints, and finally the algorithms that have been used. The challenges and limitations facing researchers in this area have also been discussed in detail in this article.