Petroleum supply planning: reformulations and a novel decomposition algorithm

Abstract

The petroleum supply planning activity is an important link for the integration of the petroleum supply chain at PETROBRAS as it is responsible for refining the strategic supply planning information to be used at the operational level. In this work we present the best strategies to solve this challenging problem. It is important to note that although the solvers in the last decade have evolved enormously, for this particular application we cannot get solutions with satisfactory quality in reasonable computational time with only the initial proposed model in Rocha et al. (Comput Chem Eng 33(12):2123–2133, 2013). To efficiently solve this problem we propose a novel decomposition algorithm and reformulations based on a cascading knapsack structure that turn out to be applicable in a wide range of problems. We show that the novel decomposition algorithm is the most appropriate method to solve the petroleum supply planning problem if we consider more than two tankers to offload each platform. In the case of one or two tankers to offload each platform, the hull relaxation formulation based on the cascading knapsack structure introduced after an inventory reformulation at platforms is the best option if one is to solve this problem. For the real application, these solution alternatives allow us to implement a general algorithm that automatically switches to the best solution option depending on the structure of the problem. This model is being tested at PETROBRAS and is proving an effective tool to help integrate its petroleum supply chain as well as to do what-if analysis to look for alternative solutions never before thought of.