Carrier Operations Research Articles

The Impact of Using Mega Containerships on Operation and Management of Shipping Lines

Abstract The container shipping industry has undergone a substantial structural alteration recently, the main cause of which stems from the enlargement of ship sizes. Previous research on the topic lacked the discussion of the impact of an upsizing policy on the inner operation and management of carriers. Through cognition agreement and decision importance, this study investigated 32 factors that may affect industrial experts whose companies own or order mega containerships. The results of this investigation reveal that cash-flow control, increasing profits, increasing feeders to collect cargo, and gaining competitive advantage are the most determinant factors that affect decision making. European carriers are more concerned than Asian carriers about the potential safety risks in navigation and the trend of persistently ordering megaships. Asian carriers recognize the decreased agility of megaship deployment but strongly dissent from European carriers.

A slot-waveguide-based polarization beam splitter assisted by epsilon-near-zero material

A slot-waveguide-based polarization beam splitter (PBS) assisted by “epsilon-near-zero” (ENZ) material is proposed and investigated. Because of the tunable complex refractive indices of indium tin oxide (ITO), ENZ effect can be achieved in the 1.55 μm regime. By embedding ITO in the slot region of the silicon waveguide, the modal characteristics of the TM mode are significantly modified, whereas that of the TE mode is nearly unchanged. Based on this feature, an asymmetric directional coupler is constructed as a PBS in which the TE mode undergoes a strong coupling to the slot waveguide nearby while the TM mode can pass through the waveguide directly. The results show that with 5.6 μm coupling length and 200 nm gap, the PBS offers 31.1 dB and 31.9 dB extinction ratio (ER) and 0.69 dB and 0.97 dB insertion loss (IL) for TE mode and TM mode, respectively. Furthermore, the impact of carrier concentration and operation wavelength on the PBS performance are investigated in detail. The proposed PBS is compatible with most of the newly developed ITO-based active photonic devices and can be a useful component for on-chip signal processing.

Optimising parcel deliveries in London using dual-mode routing

Last-mile delivery operations are complex, and the conventional way of using a single mode of delivery (e.g. driving) is not necessarily an efficient strategy. This paper describes a two-level parcel distribution model that combines walking and driving for a single driver. The model aims to minimise the total travelling time by scheduling a vehicle’s routing and the driver’s walking sequence when making deliveries, taking decisions on parking locations into consideration. The model is a variant of the Clustered Travelling Salesman Problem with Time Windows, in which the sequence of visits within each cluster is required to form a closed tour. When applied to a case study of an actual vehicle round from a parcel carrier operating in London, savings of over 20% in the total operation time were returned over the current situation where 144 parcels were being delivered to 57 delivery locations.

Investigation of Carrier Demand Response Uncertainty on Energy Flow of Renewable-Based Integrated Electricity–Gas–Heat Systems

Since there are heavy interdependencies among the electrical, heat, and gas systems to supply various load types worldwide, operation of multi-energy carrier (MEC) systems faces critical challenges. Moreover, any uncertainty rising in one carrier would directly influence the energy flow and the secure operation of the whole MEC system. This issue intensifies when an MEC system is integrated with industrial energy carrier demand response (ECDR) consumers and renewable energy sources (RESs). Large industrial ECDR consumers can increase the system uncertainty by randomly participating in the demand response programs and utilizing various carriers. Accordingly, this paper presents a powerful probabilistic tool named 2 m + 1 point estimate strategy for energy flow analysis of an integrated MEC system considering ECDR, RES, and various load types uncertainties to control the risks associated with the uncertainties. In addition, a new decomposition technique is presented to accelerate the energy flow solving of the integrated MEC systems. This technique has been promoted by adding a novel noniterative method named holomorphic embedding and the less-computational graph methods for solving the energy flow of the MEC. The proposed probabilistic energy flow is tested on an integrated MEC system employing various incentives for industrial ECDR consumers.

Path Planning for Aircraft Fleet Launching on the Flight Deck of Carriers

This paper studies the path planning problem for aircraft fleet taxiing on the flight deck of carriers, which is of great significance for improving the safety and efficiency level of launching. As there are various defects of manual command in the flight deck operation of carriers, the establishment of an automatic path planner for aircraft fleets is imperative. The requirements of launching, the particularities of the flight deck environment, the way of launch, and the work mode of catapult were analyzed. On this basis, a mathematical model was established which contains the constraints of maneuverability and the work mode of catapults; the ground motion and collision detection of aircraft are also taken into account. In the design of path planning algorithm, path tracking was combined with path planning, and the strategy of rolling optimization was applied to get the actual taxi path of each aircraft. Taking the Nimitz-class aircraft carrier as an example, the taxi paths of aircraft fleet launching was planned with the proposed method. This research can guarantee that the aircraft fleet complete launching missions safely with reasonable taxi paths.

A thermal and thermodynamic code for the computation of Boil-Off Gas – Industrial applications of LNG carrier

This paper describes the numerical method implemented in Gaztransport & Technigaz specific-purpose thermal and thermodynamic code for complex physical phenomena in Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) carrier tanks. The code is zero-dimensional and is used for LNG industrial applications and research activities in several fields related to Boil-off Gas (generation, consumption, optimization, etc.).The set of equations considered consists of the LNG and NG mass and energy conservation equations completed with equation of state and equations for LNG aging modeling. An explicit time-marching scheme with multiple-order methods is used. Specific effort has been put into the fast computation of the thermodynamic and transport properties of LNG. The implemented physical approaches have been validated by operational data.Better management of Boil-off represents a significant operational challenge for players in the LNG chain. Industrial applications illustrate important aspects of physical modeling such as saturation properties, thermal layer and sloshing. These examples also demonstrate the capability of the code to tackle a large variety of LNG carrier operating conditions and tank geometries.

Quantitative correlation between Flash and equivalent transistor for endurance electrical parameters extraction

Nowadays, the study of physical mechanisms that occur during Flash memory cell life is mandatory when reaching the 40 nm and beyond nodes in terms of reliability. In this paper we carry out a complete experimental method to extract the floating gate potential evolution during the cell aging. The dynamic current consumption during a Channel Hot Electron operation for a NOR Flash is a proper quantitative marker of the cell degradation. Here both drain and bulk currents are measured and monitored throughout the endurance tests. We coupled these characteristics with quasi-static measurements to correlate the cell degradation with an equivalent transistor. The final goal is to be able to split the physical effects of repetitive hot carrier and Fowler-Nordheim operations, typical of Flash memories, to extract the electrical parameters evolution on a simple equivalent transistor.

Schedule-Based Integrated Intercity Bus Line Planning via Branch-and-Cut

This work addresses integrated line planning for intercity bus lines, which differs in several respects from line planning in public transit. Passengers in intercity transportation decide on specific timetabled services to get to their destination. This is a contrast to an urban setting with higher frequencies, where it is generally sufficient to choose a line. Furthermore, intercity bus transportation in deregulated markets is usually characterized by fierce competition within and across modes. Customers are highly sensitive to price, time of day, duration, convenient access to stations, and service quality. Hence, bus line operators need to decide thoroughly on every single timetabled service they offer to manage the cost and revenue consequences of network design and timetable. We provide a schedule-based modeling approach integrating aspects of dynamic demand, network planning, and timetabling. For a given line corridor, locations of potential stations and ideal service times are determined simultaneously. We analyze the performance of our branch-and-cut solution approach using data from a German intercity bus carrier operating in a newly deregulated and quickly developing market. Moreover, we show that the integrated and schedule-based line planning often produces insightful new results that differ significantly from conventional approaches.

Revolutionizing LTL Carrier Operations: A Comprehensive Analysis of an Algorithm-Driven Pickup and Delivery Dispatching Solution

Revolutionizing LTL Carrier Operations: A Comprehensive Analysis of an Algorithm-Driven Pickup and Delivery Dispatching Solution

Take-off or abort? Chief Smith and Flight Line in NAS Ionian

Synopsis This case presents the leadership challenges that Chief Petty Officer Amanda Smith navigated as the first woman assigned to lead a Flight Line work center at NAS Ionian, an organization that was characterized by a culture of “hegemonic masculinity.” Failure to effectively lead the work center could have catastrophic consequences, including death of service personnel. Flight Line work centers, located in naval air stations throughout the world, serviced the air operations of aircraft carriers of the US Navy and provided allied air support. The assignment was a test of Smith’s leadership because the NAS Ionian Flight Line had experienced a spate of misconduct by personnel and had failed important maintenance inspections. Chief Smith was tasked to improve the morale and performance of the work center’s sailors who had diverse personal and professional backgrounds. She was also directed to ensure that the work center passed important maintenance inspections despite the challenges of dealing with subordinates, rank peers, and senior officers who had never previously worked with a woman in her role. Research methodology The case study is based on primary data collected from the protagonist, a.k.a. Amanda Smith. The primary data are supplemented with secondary data from published sources. The names of the air station and the protagonist have been altered to protect the identity of individuals in the case. Relevant courses and levels The case is applicable to senior undergraduate courses in HRM performance or talent management, training and development as well as in MBA or other Master’s level courses in management, industrial-organizational psychology, organizational behavior and leadership. Theoretical bases The case deals with leadership style (e.g. Initiating structure – organizing work, giving structure to the work context, defining role responsibility, scheduling work activities; consideration – building camaraderie, respect, trust, and liking between leaders and followers); organizational culture; diversity management; power and influence; and performance management.

Wheel-rail Interactions in High Speed Railway Networks during Rapid Train Transit

Implementation of high speed railway networks in India requires a thorough investigation of the contact pressure and frictional stresses induced in wheel-rail interfaces during rapid train transit. In this study, 3-D numerical moving load simulations of wheel-rail interactions in broad gauge railway networks in India were performed for fast and heavy train operations, and the trends in variation of contact pressure and frictional stresses with increase in speed of the train were quantified. Simulations were performed in ANSYS, with a hybrid model incorporating a flexible wheel-set running over a couple of rigid rails, which aided in the estimation of frictional stresses at the interface of wheel-rail contact during train run, while maintaining a reduced number of elements associated with lengthy railway track sections. Analyses were done for train operations ranging from maximum speeds of 160 to 200 km/h and an axle load of 32.5 tonnes, as recommended by Indian Railways for operation of freight carriers in the existing broad gauge tracks. It was noted that with increase in speeds of trains, there was a reduction in the area of wheel-rail contact. The elliptical Hertzian contact patch of the static train wheels were found to transform into a more rounded patch during rapid train transit, causing concentration of stresses at the centre and effectively increasing the maximum stresses at the points of contact. Contact pressure and frictional stresses were found to increase quadratically, with an increase in the speed of the train. It was ascertained that the rate of wheel and rail wear during high speed train operations would be significant, and that high speed networks would require new wheel and rail sections, and the adoption of materials with very high frictional wear capacity.

Optimum operation of multi-energy carriers in the context of an energy hub considering a wind generator based on linear programming

This paper presents a model that can be easily used to resolve the energy hub operation problem. The proposed model considers the uncertainty in the input and output ports. The energy hub optimum operation problem needs to be resolved in order to supply several energy loads in combination at the minimum total energy cost. In this study, mixed-integer linear programming was applied to formulate this optimization problem. The power balance, energy storage, and converter limitations of the input and output ports were included as equality and inequality constraints. The total cost of an energy hub was determined by the price of energy carriers. Eventually, deterministic and stochastic versions of the proposed model were tested in a case study. In the test system, electricity, gas, and wind generation were used in the input port, and the output port contained the electrical and thermal load. The results demonstrated that a stochastic model based on different scenarios was more realistic than a deterministic model. However, the total operating cost of an energy hub decreased more in the stochastic model compared to the deterministic model.

Are Low Cost Carriers a problem for the management of regional airports?

Abstract Authors examine the impact of low cost carriers on regional airport performance. The question is whether a business model oriented predominantly on low cost carrier operation is sustainable. These issues are explored in a developed German economy, which is not affected by the problems of the transformation of the economy. Despite the fact that the selected regional airports handle millions of passengers, their results are not positive. On the contrary, Austrian regional airports make a profit, even though they carry a comparable number of passengers. The type of airport ownership does not have a significant effect on its performance. If an airport is not subsidized, the business model must be altered, or it is necessary to find other sources of income, for example in the non-aviation area. The question is whether this issue should be dealt with by the EU institutions in the area of significant market power and oligopolistic practices of low cost carriers.

МОДУЛЬ ДИАГНОСТИКИ ДВИГАТЕЛЯ ВНУТРЕННЕГО СГОРАНИЯ В СИСТЕМЕ ПОДДЕРЖКИ ПРИНЯТИЯ РЕШЕНИЙ ЭКИПАЖЕМ ТАНКЕРА-ГАЗОВОЗА

The article contains information on the development of a module for diagnosing an internal combustion engine in terms of a decision support system for a crew of a gas carrier. The diagnostic module of the internal combustion engine in the decision support system allows reducing the volumes of information processed by the operator, which helps minimize the influence of "a human factor" on safety of a gas carrier operation. The main function of the diagnostic module of internal combustion engines is to detect deviations in values of operational parameters that indicate violations in the state of the nodes and engine parts or failures in operation. Based on the detected deviations, the diagnostic subsystem of the developed module can determine malfunctions of the internal combustion engine at the initial stage and deter its damage. Further, appropriate proposals should be developed for a gas carrier operator to eliminate failures or minimize the negative impact. These imply correcting the modes of operation of the engine or its systems, or taking specific measures to perform maintenance or repair of the relevant units and parts. The module for diagnosing the internal combustion engine in terms of the decision support system is proposed to be built on three-level architecture: primary (lower) level; level of data transmission; control and analytical level. Technical implementation of the developed diagnostic module for internal combustion engine assumes the use of existing diagnostic tools and additional means of collecting information on various engine functional parameters. A block diagram of the internal combustion engine diagnostic module has been provided and the main functions of the decision support system modules have been described. As a result of functioning of the module for diagnosing the internal combustion engine in terms of decision support system for the gas carrier crew, specific recommendations have been developed and displayed, which allows avoiding dangerous and emergency situations in the operation process.

Overview of 3GPP Release 14 Enhanced NB-IoT

In 3GPP LTE Release 13, Narrowband Internet of Things (NB-IoT) was standardized for providing wide-area connectivity for massive machine-type communications for IoT. In LTE Release 14, NB-IoT was further developed to deliver enhanced user experience in selected areas through the addition of features such as increased positioning accuracy, increased peak data rates, the introduction of a lower device power class, improved non-anchor carrier operation, multicast, and authorization of coverage enhancements. In this article, we provide an overview of these features introduced for NB-IoT in LTE Release 14. An analysis is given on the applicability of these features and their benefits to enhance the NB-IoT radio access technology.

Organic electronic synapses with pinched hystereses based on graphene quantum-dot nanocomposites

Organic electronic synapses (e-synapses) based on poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene) polystyrene sulfonate (PEDOT:PSS)/graphene quantum dot (GQD) nanocomposites are fabricated by using a solution method. Current–voltage (I–V) curves for the devices under dual positive bias voltage sweeps show that the conductance with a pinched hysteresis gradually increased with increasing applied voltage, and those for the devices under dual negative bias voltage sweeps gradually decreased with increasing applied voltage, indicative of the fingerprint of e-synapses. The current in the devices decreases with increasing concentration of GQDs in the active layer, and the devices fabricated utilizing the ratio of PEDOT:PSS to GQDs of 1:0.4 shows the best performance among the e-synapses. The carrier transport and operating mechanisms of the e-synapses are described on the basis of both the I–V results and the trapping and escape of electrons from the GQDs.

Tracking progress in marine climatology

This special section accumulates articles from the Fourth JCOMM Workshop on Advances in Marine Climatology (CLIMAR-IV) held in Asheville, NC, USA from 9 to 12 June 2014. Since the first workshop in Vancouver in 1999, CLIMAR Workshops track the progress in marine climatology comprehensively covering scientific, methodological and data management issues of marine climatology (see e.g. Gulev, 2005; Gulev and Woodruff, 2011). Marine climatological data play a crucial role in assessing past and ongoing climate variability and change. Without long-term global and regional time series of marine climatological data, we cannot track global climate and quantify the ocean's role in climate variability and change. Besides estimation of variability of surface state variables, marine climatological data allow for computation of surface air–sea fluxes – the language of ocean and atmosphere communication. Also marine climatological archives provide invaluable contribution to the data assimilated by modern reanalyses, some of which are going back now to the 19th century, documenting the dynamically consistent history of the climate system. Marine climatological records (e.g. information about winds and waves) are also widely used for estimation of extreme events over the ocean, including storminess, storm surges and extreme sea level rise. These phenomena are of great importance for all types of marine structures, including operations of marine carriers and offshore engineering. Finally, marine climatological data provide an important source of in situ information for validation of satellite measurements of surface meteorological variables. However to be useful for all mentioned purposes, marine climatological data need to be accurately assembled, quality controlled and supplied with estimates of all types of uncertainties. These include measurement errors associated with the accuracy of instruments and with historical changes in observational practices which may affect not only climatological means but also estimates of climate variability. In addition to measurement errors, marine climatological data are subject to sampling uncertainties, originating from space and time inhomogeneities of sampling density, collected by merchant ships primarily along the major shipping routes. Unless these uncertainties are properly estimated, marine climatological data sets are more difficult to be effectively used for any purpose. For many years, starting from the late 1980s marine climatological data are assimilated in the International Comprehensive Ocean–atmosphere Data Set (ICOADS), representing now a unique freely available digital archive covering the period from the 17th century onwards including individual ship reports and Monthly Summary Group (MSG) statistical products. ICOADS has played a central role in all CLIMAR Workshops, and also with the alternate but associated Workshops on the Advances in the Use of Historical MARine Climate DATa (MARCDAT) focused on more technical issues of the analysis of marine data. Thus, it is very natural that CLIMAR-IV was organized in conjunction with the First ICOADS Value-Added Database (IVAD-I) Workshop held on 13 June 2014 at the same location. During CLIMAR-IV about 50 participants from around the world presented more than 50 oral talks and 10 posters organized in 8 sessions focused on all aspects of the use of marine climatological data from pre-processing and quality control to estimation of surface fluxes and assessment of climate variability and change. General and plenary discussions resulted in recommendations focused on best practices for estimation of uncertainties, developing metadata, cross-validation of marine climatological information and applications for different areas of climate and ocean science. Articles in this Special Section cover recent developments of ICOADS and guidance on the latest ICOADS Release 3.0 – the most recent and complete data set of marine climatological data (Freeman et al., 2017), problems of analysing spatially inhomogeneous data collected along the merchant ship routes (Berry and Kent, 2017; Carella et al., 2017) and impact of marine meteorological data on the estimates of variability in ocean heat content (Good, 2017). We note that many more results from the Workshop were and will be published in regular issues of International Journal of Climatology and the other relevant journals. We would like to take this opportunity to thank the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), Intergovernmental Oceanographic Committee (IOC) of UNESCO and the UK National Oceanography Centre in Southampton for supporting CLIMAR-IV Workshop. Our special thanks go to the NOAA Climate Program Office for their long-term support of ICOADS. We thank the Royal Meteorological Society and our publisher Wiley and Sons for nearly two decades of support for publications on marine climatology.

A reduced fidelity model for the rotary chemical looping combustion reactor

The rotary chemical looping combustion reactor has great potential for efficient integration with CO2 capture-enabled energy conversion systems. In earlier studies, we described a one-dimensional rotary reactor model, and used it to demonstrate the feasibility of continuous reactor operation. Though this detailed model provides a high resolution representation of the rotary reactor performance, it is too computationally expensive for studies that require multiple model evaluations. Specifically, it is not ideal for system-level studies where the reactor is a single component in an energy conversion system. In this study, we present a reduced fidelity model (RFM) of the rotary reactor that reduces computational cost and determines an optimal combination of variables that satisfy reactor design requirements. Simulation results for copper, nickel and iron-based oxygen carriers show a four-order of magnitude reduction in simulation time, and reasonable prediction accuracy. Deviations from the detailed reference model predictions range from 3% to 20%, depending on oxygen carrier type and operating conditions. This study also demonstrates how the reduced model can be modified to deal with both optimization and design oriented problems. A parametric study using the reduced model is then applied to analyze the sensitivity of the optimal reactor design to changes in selected operating and kinetic parameters. These studies show that temperature and activation energy have a greater impact on optimal geometry than parameters like pressure or feed fuel fraction for the selected oxygen carrier materials.

China’s Military Power: Assessing Current and Future Capabilities, by Roger Cliff. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015. xvi+362 pp. US$99.99 (cloth), US$32.99 (paper), US26.00 (eBook).

<i>China’s Military Power: Assessing Current and Future Capabilities</i>, by Roger Cliff. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015. xvi+362 pp. US$99.99 (cloth), US$32.99 (paper), US26.00 (eBook).

An Evaluation Method for Sortie Generation Capacity of Carrier Aircrafts with Principal Component Reduction and Catastrophe Progression Method

This study proposes a new comprehensive evaluation method with principal component reduction and catastrophe progression method, considering the complexity, hierarchy, contradiction, and relevance of the factors in sortie generation of carrier aircrafts. First of all, the index system of sortie generation capacity is ascertained, which contains correlative indexes. The principal component reduction method is applied to transform the correlative indexes into independent indexes. This method eliminates the effect of correlativity among indexes. The principal components are determined with their contributions. Then the reduced principal components are evaluated in catastrophe progression method. This method is easy to realize without weights, which is more objective. In fact, catastrophe progression method is a multidimensional fuzzy membership function, which is suitable for the incompatible multiobjective evaluation. Thus, a two-level evaluation method for sortie generation capacity of carrier aircrafts is realized with principal component reduction and catastrophe progression method. Finally, the Surge operation of aircraft carrier “Nimitz” is taken as an example to evaluate the sortie generation capacity. The results of the proposed method are compared with those of Analytic Hierarchy Process, which verify the usefulness and reliability of the proposed method.