Developing Early Risk Detection and Preparedness System with Risk Analysis and Contingency Plan

PresentationWhen the natural or human-made disasters, such as hurricanes, floods, tornadoes, wildfires and gas leaks, threaten a populated area, mass casualties and property losses may be followed. To avoid, minimize or eliminate the risks for public safety, a well-organized early risk detection and preparedness system is needed in order to save lives and minimize losses. To make this early detection system efficient yet effective, a mobile app, risk preparedness aid, was developed. This aid system can communicate with sensors, location information, and disaster management server. The aid was designed using the concepts of location based service and risk management and it includes gas leak detection, warning and emergency evacuation procedure with routing. Based on the identified risks and preparing procedure, various contingency plans were developed. The contingency plans should be very clear so that it is easy for public and employee to follow. Because each system has unique infrastructure its contingency plan must be unique. This paper also shows an evacuation process in the form of a flowchart for ease of use in the event of an emergency

Synthetic Control and Dynamic Panel Estimation: A Case Study of Iran

International sanctions imposed on Iran, targeting primarily Iran’s key energy sector and its ability to access the international financial system, have harmed Iran’s economic growth, specifically from 2011 to 2014. This thesis uses this case to study and compare the applicability of two different popular approaches used in comparative case studies exploring the effect of a policy intervention. In the Chapter 1 we study the synthetic control method. Using this method, we estimate the effect of the intensification of sanctions on Iran’s GDP during the period 2011 to 2014. The year of 2011 was Iran’s first full year under these heavy sanctions, and in 2015, the Iran nuclear deal framework was established. Prior to this time, in spite of the ongoing U.S. sanctions, Iran’s GDP had a positive trend from 1990 to 2011. However, our estimates show that the GDP suffered a hit of more than 17 percent over the period under question. We find that these effects were particularly severe in 2012 – the same year of the enforcement by the European Union of an oil embargo and added financial boycotts against Iran. In Chapter 2, we take a different approach to the same case, and incorporate a more structural and traditional framework. We use a Difference-in-Difference model as well as a dynamic panel data model to estimate the effect of sanctions. According to the dynamic panel data estimation, the cumulative effect of sanctions on the country’s GDP is −11.40,−18.12, and −18.62 percent for 2012, 2013, and 2014. In this chapter, we also compare the synthetic control method with the dynamic panel data regression framework. First, we show that the synthetic control method provides an unbiased estimator if the underlying model of the outcome variable of interest is a dynamic panel data model. Second, we compare the prediction power of these two methods. In Chapter 3 we design a Monte Carlo study to discuss the performance of the methods used in previous chapters over many replications. In this chapter, we examine the robustness of the method. We conclude that the dynamic panel data model seems to be performing well with the macro level aggregate data, and the assumptions are appropriate. However, for the synthetic control method we observe large standard error in the estimated values. If we translate that to a significance analysis, this means that even though we observe meaningful values reported as the effect of the intervention, they are not statistically significantly different from 0

Developing New Methods for Efficient Container Stacking Operations

Containerized transportation has become an essential part of the intermodal freight transport. Millions of containers pass through container terminals on an annual basis. Handling a large number of containers arriving and leaving terminals by different modalities including the new mega-size ships significantly affects the performance of terminals. Container terminal operators are always looking for new technologies and smart solutions to maintain efficiency. They need to know how different operations at the terminal interact and affect the performance of the terminal as a whole. Among all operations, the stacking area is of special importance since almost every container must be stacked in this area for a period of time. If the stacking operations of the terminal are not well managed, then the response time of the terminal significantly increases and consequently the performance decreases. In this dissertation, we propose, develop, and test optimization methods to support the decisions of container terminal operators in the stacking area. First, we study how to sequence storage and retrieval containers to be carried out by a single or two automated stacking cranes in a block of containers. The objective is to minimize the makespan of the cranes. Finally, we study how to minimize the expected number of reshuffles when incoming containers have to be stacked in a block of containers. A reshuffle is the removal of a container stacked on top of a desired container. Reshuffling containers is one of the daily operations at a container terminal which is time consuming and increases a ship's berthing time

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

A multi-objective model for inventory and planned production reassignment to committed orders with homogeneity requirements

[EN] Certain industries are characterized by obtaining non-homogeneous units of the same product. However, customers require homogeneity in some attributes between units of the same and different products requesting in their orders. To commit such orders, an estimation of the homogeneous product to be obtained can be used. Unfortunately, estimations of homogenous product quantities can differ considerably from real distributions. This fact could entail the impossibility of accomplishing the delivery of customer orders in the terms previously committed. To solve this, we propose a multi-objective mathematical programming model to reallocate already available homogeneous products in stock and planned production to committed orders. The main contributions of this model are the consideration of the homogeneity requirement between units of different lines of the same order, the allowance of partial deliveries of order lines, and the specification of some relevant attributes of products to accomplish with the customer homogeneity requirement. Different hypotheses are proved through experiments and statistical analyses applied to a ceramic tile company. The epsilon-constraint method is used to obtain an implementable solution for the company. The weighted sum method is used when proving other hypotheses that offer some managerial insights to companies.This work was supported by the Program of Formation of University Professors (FPU) of the Spanish Ministry of Education, Culture and Sport (FPU15/03595), and by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness Project DPI2011-23597.Esteso, A.; Alemany Díaz, MDM.; Ortiz Bas, Á.; Peidro Payá, D. (2018). A multi-objective model for inventory and planned production reassignment to committed orders with homogeneity requirements. Computers & Industrial Engineering. 124:180-194. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cie.2018.07.025S18019412

A Simple Measure to Study Multinational Income Inequality

Using the Big Mac Index, we offer a simple measure to study the real income inequality. We provide a multidimensional real income inequality analysis by exploring the Coefficient of Variation and the Big Mac Affordability of households across all income deciles of 28 countries for the years 2000 to 2013. We look more into a few of the most interesting countries in our analysis in order to have explanations for the wide range of income inequality we observe. We compare Denmark and Mexico as representatives of the “more equal” and “less equal” countries in our analysis, and we find a visible difference in the share of each decile to the top decile of income between the two countries. However, we observe that, although a more equal country, Denmark has been exp eriencing a rise in income inequality while a less equal country (Mexico) has been experiencing a reduction in income inequality. We also focus on the United States and study how it compares to Russia, a country that shows a different direction of income inequality compared to the U.S.A. We find that while the wage income inequality in Russia has been correlated inversely with its growth, in the U.S.A., the overall growth and wage income inequality have been positively correlated