Exact Solution of the Robust Knapsack Problem

We consider an uncertain variant of the knapsack problem in which the weight of the items is not exactly known in advance, but belongs to a given interval, and an upper bound is imposed on the number of items whose weight di ffers from the expected one. For this problem, we provide a dynamic programming algorithm … Read more

Optimal management and sizing of energy storage under dynamic pricing for the efficient integration of renewable energy

In this paper, we address the optimal energy storage management and sizing problem in the presence of renewable energy and dynamic pricing. We formulate the problem as a stochastic dynamic programming problem that aims to minimize the long-term average cost of conventional generation used as well as investment in storage, if any, while satisfying all … Read more

Evolutionary Dynamic Optimization: A Survey of the State of the Art

Optimization in dynamic environments is a challenging but important task since many real-world optimization problems are changing over time. Evolutionary computation and swarm intelligence are good tools to address optimization problems in dynamic environments due to their inspiration from natural self-organized systems and biological evolution, which have always been subject to changing environments. Evolutionary optimization … Read more

Time Consistency Decisions and Temporal Decomposition of Coherent Risk Functionals

It is well known that most risk measures (risk functionals) are time inconsistent in the following sense: It may happen that today some loss distribution appears to be less risky than another, but looking at the conditional distribution at a later time, the opposite relation holds. In this article we demonstrate that this time inconsistency … Read more

On the convergence of decomposition methods for multi-stage stochastic convex programs

We prove the almost-sure convergence of a class of sampling-based nested decomposition algorithms for multistage stochastic convex programs in which the stage costs are general convex functions of the decisions, and uncertainty is modelled by a scenario tree. As special cases, our results imply the almost-sure convergence of SDDP, CUPPS and DOASA when applied to … Read more

A Dynamic Programming Heuristic for the Quadratic Knapsack Problem

It is well known that the standard (linear) knapsack problem can be solved exactly by dynamic programming in O(nc) time, where n is the number of items and c is the capacity of the knapsack. The quadratic knapsack problem, on the other hand, is NP-hard in the strong sense, which makes it unlikely that it … Read more

Time consistency of dynamic risk measures

In this paper we discuss time consistency of risk averse multistage stochastic programming problems. We show, in a framework of finite scenario trees, that composition of law invariant coherent risk measures can be law invariant only for the expectation or max-risk measures. CitationPreprintArticleDownload View PDF

Time-inconsistent multistage stochastic programs: martingale bounds

Abstract. It is well known that multistage programs, which maximize expectation or expected utility, allow a dynamic programming formulation, and that other objectives destroy the dynamic programming character of the problem. This paper considers a risk measure at the final stage of a multistage stochastic program. Although these problems are not time consistent, it is … Read more

Optimal Toll Design: A Lower Bound Framework for the Asymmetric Traveling Salesman Problem

We propose a framework of lower bounds for the asymmetric traveling salesman problem (TSP) based on approximating the dynamic programming formulation with diff erent basis vector sets. We discuss how several well-known TSP lower bounds correspond to intuitive basis vector choices and give an economic interpretation wherein the salesman must pay tolls as he travels between … Read more

Managing Operational and Financing Decisions to Meet Consumption Targets

We study dynamic operational decision problems where risky cash flows are being resolved over a finite planning horizon. Financing decisions via lending and borrowing are available to smooth out consumptions over time with the goal of achieving some prescribed consumption targets. Our target-oriented decision criterion is based on the aggregation of Aumann and Serrano (2008) … Read more