Differential evolution algorithm with local search for capacitated vehicle routing problem

This paper presents an improved differential evolution algorithm with local search (DELS) for solving the capacitated vehicle routing problem (CVRP). The CVRP is a classical vehicle routing problem with additional constraint where the capacity of the vehicle travelling on a specific route cannot exceed the maximum vehicle capacity. Local search procedures help to explore new search areas and refine the solutions found. The proposed algorithm is tested on CVRP instances described by Augerat et al. and Christofides and Eilon. The proposed DELS approach generate quality solutions for the benchmark problems tested and are comparable to the algorithms reported in the literature.