Mixed integer and heuristics model for the inventory routing problem in fuel delivery.

This paper follows the same procedure as Vidovi´c et al. (2014). We present solution approaches for the multi-product multi-period Inventory Routing Problem (IRP) in fuel delivery. A homogeneous fleet of vehicles with trailers is used for the distribution of full compartments of fuel from a single depot to a set of fuel stations. The daily fuel consumptions follow a discrete probability function. To solve the IRP, a Mixed Integer Programming (MIP) model is proposed. To observe the impact of the fleet size costs on the obtained solutions we propose heuristics with and without fleet size costs. The heuristics model is based on constructive heuristics and is further improved with two search types: a local intra-period and a large intra-period neighborhood search. By testing on some of the assumptions made in Vidovi´c et al. (2014), we question some of the results they presented in their paper.