Sea Container Terminals

Due to a rapid growth in world trade and a huge increase in containerized goods, sea container terminals play a vital role in globe-spanning supply chains. Container terminals should be able to handle large ships, with large call sizes within the shortest time possible, and at competitive rates. In response, terminal operators, shipping liners, and port authorities are investing in new technologies to improve container handling infrastructure and operational efficiency. Container terminals face challenging research problems which have received much attention from the academic community. The focus of this paper is to highlight the recent developments in the container terminals, which can be categorized into three areas: (1) innovative container terminal technologies, (2) new OR directions and models for existing research areas, and (3) emerging areas in container terminal research. By choosing this focus, we complement existing reviews on container terminal operations

INNOVATIVE SIMULATION AND OPTIMIZATION STUDIES ON GRID SYSTEM FOR TRANSSHIPMENT TERMINAL

Ph.DDOCTOR OF PHILOSOPH

The synergistic effect of operational research and big data analytics in greening container terminal operations: a review and future directions

Container Terminals (CTs) are continuously presented with highly interrelated, complex, and uncertain planning tasks. The ever-increasing intensity of operations at CTs in recent years has also resulted in increasing environmental concerns, and they are experiencing an unprecedented pressure to lower their emissions. Operational Research (OR), as a key player in the optimisation of the complex decision problems that arise from the quay and land side operations at CTs, has been therefore presented with new challenges and opportunities to incorporate environmental considerations into decision making and better utilise the ‘big data’ that is continuously generated from the never-stopping operations at CTs. The state-of-the-art literature on OR's incorporation of environmental considerations and its interplay with Big Data Analytics (BDA) is, however, still very much underdeveloped, fragmented, and divergent, and a guiding framework is completely missing. This paper presents a review of the most relevant developments in the field and sheds light on promising research opportunities for the better exploitation of the synergistic effect of the two disciplines in addressing CT operational problems, while incorporating uncertainty and environmental concerns efficiently. The paper finds that while OR has thus far contributed to improving the environmental performance of CTs (rather implicitly), this can be much further stepped up with more explicit incorporation of environmental considerations and better exploitation of BDA predictive modelling capabilities. New interdisciplinary research at the intersection of conventional CT optimisation problems, energy management and sizing, and net-zero technology and energy vectors adoption is also presented as a prominent line of future research

Models and Solutions Algorithms for Improving Operations in Marine Transportation

International seaborne trade rose significantly during the past decades. This created the need to improve efficiency of liner shipping services and marine container terminal operations to meet the growing demand. The objective of this dissertation is to develop simulation and mathematical models that may enhance operations of liner shipping services and marine container terminals, taking into account the main goals of liner shipping companies (e.g., reduce fuel consumption and vessel emissions, ensure on-time arrival to each port of call, provide vessel scheduling strategies that capture sailing time variability, consider variable port handling times, increase profit, etc.) and terminal operators (e.g., decrease turnaround time of vessels, improve terminal productivity without significant capital investments, reduce possible vessel delays and associated penalties, ensure fast recovery in case of natural and man-made disasters, make the terminal competitive, maximize revenues, etc.). This dissertation proposes and models two alternatives for improving operations of marine container terminals: 1) a floaterm concept and 2) a new contractual agreement between terminal operators. The main difference between floaterm and conventional marine container terminals is that in the former case some of import and/or transshipment containers are handled by off-shore quay cranes and placed on container barges, which are further towed by push boats to assigned feeder vessels or floating yard. According to the new collaborative agreement, a dedicated marine container terminal operator can divert some of its vessels for the service at a multi-user terminal during specific time windows. Another part of dissertation focuses on enhancing operations of liner shipping services by introducing the following: 1) a new collaborative agreement between a liner shipping company and terminal operators and 2) a new framework for modeling uncertainty in liner shipping. A new collaborative mechanism assumes that each terminal operator is able to offer a set of handling rates to a liner shipping company, which may result in a substantial total route service cost reduction. The suggested framework for modeling uncertainty is expected to assist liner shipping companies in designing robust vessel schedules

Heuristic container placement algorithms

Thesis (Master)--Izmir Institute of Technology, Computer Engineering, Izmir, 2003Includes bibliographical references (leaves: 56-58)Text in English; Abstract: Turkish and Englishviii, 72 leavesWith the growth of transportation over sea; defining transportation processes in a better way and finding ways to make transportation processes more effective have become one of the most important research areas of today. Especially in the last quartet of the previous decade, the computers had become much powerful tools with their impressive amount of data processing cababilites. It was imminent that computers had begun taking serious roles in the system development studies. As a result; constructing models for the processes in container terminals and processing the data with the computers create opportunities for the automation of various processes in container terminals. The final step of these studies is the full automation of terminal activities with software packages that combine various functions focused on various processes in a single system.This study is about a project that had been made for a container terminal owned by a special company. During this study; there had been discussions with experts about the subject, and container handling processes in the terminal had been analyzed in order to define the main structure of the yard management software to be created.This study focuses on the container handling activities over the yard space so as to create a basis for a computer system that will take part in the decisions during the container operations. Object oriented analysis and design methods are used for the definition of the system that will help the decisions in the yard operations. The optimization methodology that will be the core of the container placement decisions is based on using different placement patterns and placement algorithms for different conditions. These placement patterns and algorithms are constructed due to the container handling machinery that was being used in the terminal that this study has been made for

Integrated vehicle dispatching for container terminal

Ph.DDOCTOR OF PHILOSOPH

Optimization of yard operations in container terminals from an energy efficiency approach

This Thesis addresses common operational issues related to maritime container terminals. In the last decades, containerization of maritime transportation has grown very rapidly, forcing terminal operators to cope with unprecedented volumes of containers in a continuous manner. As a consequence, terminal efficiency is always a critical factor. In the near future, operators are also expected to face increasing operational costs deriving firstly from the energy crisis and secondly from new regulations enforcing ports to become more environmentally friendly. As a consequence, operational inefficiencies deriving from periods of congestion require innovative solutions and optimization techniques to improve the efficiency and productivity in the terminal yard. This Thesis addresses such problems by introducing an electric energy consumption model that characterizes energy expenditure of yard cranes. For each gantry, trolley and hoist movement of the cranes, the model takes into account the different resistances that must be overcome during the acceleration, constant speed and deceleration phases of each movement. The energy consumption model is coupled to two different discrete event simulation models of one parallel and one perpendicular container terminals, with the goal to analyze the handling operations and optimize energy efficiency and productivity. One additional innovative aspect of the works is that they include the effect of the volume of container traffic in the analysis with the aim to assess differences in the performance of the algorithms under a range of realistic scenarios, which is usually neglected in similar studies. Finally, in addition to stacking and retrieval operations, the works also introduce housekeeping operation, which are common in the real world but often disregarded in the literature. Such operations are relevant as they may be critical in terms of achieving good productivity, but on the other hand they amount for a significant portion of the overall energy consumption. In particular, the works of the Thesis deal have four particular objectives: (1) providing such flexible and customizable numerical models of discrete event type to simulate and analyze parallel and perpendicular terminals, (2) proposing a new stacking algorithm to reduce energy expenditure and improve automatic stacking crane productivity in perpendicular terminals; (3) optimizing the dimensions of a perpendicular layout; and (4) analyzing the distribution of containers in the yard layout as a function of the moment at which space for export containers is reserved while looking at the operational costs. In the first place, results show the models are capable of characterizing in detail the energy consumption associated to crane movements in both parallel and perpendicular terminals. With respect to perpendicular terminals, the proposed stacking algorithm is capable of improving the energy efficiency up to around 20% while achieving greater productivity at the same time. In addition, results show that the dimensions of a perpendicular terminal block can be optimized so as to improve the productivity; with respect to energy consumption, although a smaller block induces lesser electrical consumption, the random nature of housekeeping operations produce a significant degree of distortion in the results, revealing that such operations constitute a promising flied for future research. Finally, considering parallel terminals, a greater degree of clustering is observed as the reservation is made earlier. When considering the associated operational costs associated to yard cranes and yard trucks, greater clustering results in more efficient use of the energy, and therefore reservation may be desirable when possible to enhance terminal productivity.Esta Tesis aborda temas operativos comunes relacionados con terminales marítimas de contenedores. En las últimas décadas, la contenerización del transporte marítimo ha crecido exponencialmente, obligando a los operadores a hacer frente a volúmenes de contenedores sin precedentes de manera continuada. Como consecuencia, la eficiencia de las operaciones es siempre un factor crítico. En un futuro próximo, los operadores también deberán afrontar crecientes costes operativos derivados de la crisis energética, y también de nuevas regulaciones que obligan a los puertos a volverse más respetuosos con el medio ambiente. Por estos motivos, las ineficiencias operativas derivadas de períodos de congestión requieren soluciones innovadoras y técnicas de optimización para mejorar la eficiencia y productividad en los patios de contenedores. Esta tesis aborda estos problemas introduciendo un modelo de consumo de energía eléctrica que caracteriza el gasto de las grúas de patio. Para cada movimiento de "gantry", "hoist" y "spreader", el modelo tiene en cuenta las diferentes resistencias que deben superarse durante las fases de aceleración, velocidad constante y deceleración del movimiento. El modelo de consumo de energía se ha acoplado a dos modelos de simulación de eventos discretos de terminales de contenedores, una paralela y otra perpendicular, con el objetivo de analizar las operaciones de manipulación y optimizar la eficiencia energética y la productividad. Otro aspecto innovador de este trabajo es que analiza el efecto del volumen de tráfico de contenedores con el objetivo de evaluar el comportamiento de los algoritmos bajo un rango de escenarios realistas, lo que generalmente no se tiene en cuenta en estudios similares. Por último, además de las operaciones de apilamiento y salida de contenedores, la tesis también considera las operaciones de reordenamiento del patio, muy comunes en el mundo real, pero que a menudo no se tienen en cuenta en la literatura. Tales operaciones pueden ser críticas para lograr una buena productividad, pero por otra parte representan una parte importante del consumo total de energía. En particular, los trabajos desarrollados en esta Tesis tienen cuatro objetivos concretos: (1) proporcionar modelos numéricos flexibles y configurables de tipo eventos discretos para simular y analizar terminales paralelas y perpendiculares, (2) proponer un nuevo algoritmo de apilamiento para reducir el gasto de energía y mejorar la productividad de la grúa automático en terminales perpendiculares; (3) optimizar las dimensiones de un bloque de una terminal perpendicular; y (4) analizar la distribución de los contenedores en la disposición del patio en función del momento en que se reserva el espacio para los contenedores de exportación. Los resultados muestran que, en primer lugar, los modelos son capaces de caracterizar en detalle el consumo de energía asociado a los movimientos de las grúas en ambos tipos de terminales. Con respecto a las terminales perpendiculares, el algoritmo de apilado propuesto es capaz de mejorar la eficiencia energética hasta aproximadamente un 20%, al tiempo que se consigue una mayor productividad. Además, los resultados muestran que las dimensiones de un bloque perpendicular pueden optimizarse para mejorar la productividad; con respecto al consumo de energía, aunque un bloque más pequeño induce un menor consumo eléctrico, la naturaleza aleatoria de las operaciones de reordenación inducen un grado significativo de distorsión en los resultados, indicando que tales operaciones pueden ser objeto de futura investigación. Por último, respecto a las terminales paralelas, a medida que se adelanta la reserva de espacio los contenedores presentan un mayor grado de agrupación, lo que redunda en un uso más eficeficiente de la energía debido a los menores costos operacionales asociados a grúas y camiones de patio, por lo que la reserva puede ser aconsejable cuando sea posible para mejorar la productividad del termina

A computer graphics approach to logistics strategy modelling

This thesis describes the development and application of a decision support system for logistics strategy modelling. The decision support system that is developed enables the modelling of logistics systems at a strategic level for any country or area in the world. The model runs on IBM PC or compatible computers under DOS (disk operating system). The decision support system uses colour graphics to represent the different physical functions of a logistics system. The graphics of the system is machine independent. The model displays on the screen the map of the area or country which is being considered for logistic planning. The decision support system is hybrid in term of algorithm. It employs optimisation for allocation. The customers are allocated by building a network path from customer to the source points taking into consideration all the production and throughput constraints on factories, distribution depots and transshipment points. The system uses computer graphic visually interactive heuristics to find the best possible location for distribution depots and transshipment points. In a one depot system it gives the optimum solution but where more than one depot is involved, the optimum solution is not guaranteed. The developed model is a cost-driven model. It represents all the logistics system costs in their proper form. Its solution very much depends on the relationship between all the costs. The locations of depots and transshipment points depend on the relationship between inbound and outbound transportation costs. The model has been validated on real world problems, some of which are described here. The advantages of such a decision support system for the formulation of a problem are discussed. Also discussed is the contribution of such an approach at the validation and solution presentation stages

DISPATCHING AND CONFLICT-FREE ROUTING OF VEHICLES IN NEW CONCEPTUAL AUTOMATED CONTAINER TERMINALS

Ph.DDOCTOR OF PHILOSOPH