Comparing different technologies for containers movement in marine container terminals

Abstract

The explosive growth of freight volumes has greatly increased the work of seaports and urged the port authorities to adopt advanced technologies to cope with the booming containerships. Automated operations providing high efficiency have been considered as one of the ways to deal with this problem. Linear Motors Conveyor Systems (LMCS) and Automated Guided Vehicle Systems (AGVS) are the two candidate automation systems that can be used to improve the performance of yard operations. In this paper, simulation models of LMCS and AGVS employed in marine container terminals are developed to investigate the effect of automation and different cargo handling technologies. Yard performance measures are evaluated by Multi Attribute Decision Making (MADM) method to determine the optimal number of vehicles needed to be deployed. The simulation results show how the performance of the terminal increases when LMCS/AGVS are deployed. The differences between the two technologies, LMCS and AGVS, are also investigated using the developed simulation models.