Investigating Robust and Stochastic Optimisation Methods For Automated Container Terminals

研究自动化集装箱码头的鲁棒随机优化方法

• 批准号: EP/F044895/1
• 负责人: Michael Bell
• 金额: $ 67.96万
• 依托单位: Imperial College London
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Research Grant
• 财政年份: 2008
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2008 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=EP%2FF044895%2F1
• 关键词: Investigating; Robust; Stochastic; Optimisation; Methods

The port industry plays a strategic role in the UK economy. There has been growing interest, particularly from European ports, in the automation of container terminals as a way to improve their efficiency and reliability. Plans for the new London Gateway container terminal on the former Shell Haven site envisage the highest degree of automation to date, providing a unique opportunity for the UK to develop strategically important expertise in automation software. This proposal seeks to develop innovative approaches based on robust and stochastic optimisation methods to control the automated horizontal and vertical movement of containers within the terminal and the implementation of these methods in prototype control software. Robust optimisation involves the definition of intervals for key parameters, like the start time and duration for container movements, and then looks for a solution that minimises maximum regret with respect to realisations of parameters. The optimisation takes future events into account through a rolling planning horizon. As an alternative to robust optimisation, stochastic optimisation deals with the uncertainty via a scenario analysis. In this approach, the uncertainty related to system components / parameters is modelled by a number of scenarios (or sub-problems) derived from an underlying optimization problem and the information structure can be represented as a tree, with each scenario corresponding to a path from the root of the tree out to a leaf. As both the robust and stochastic optimisation problems are in general NP-hard, heuristic methods will be devised to allow implementation in real time. The prototype control software will be tested in simulation before being made available to UK port operators.

港口产业在英国经济中扮演着战略性的角色。人们（尤其是欧洲港口）对集装箱码头自动化的兴趣日益浓厚，认为这是提高其效率和可靠性的一种方式。在原壳牌港（Shell Haven）的基地上，新伦敦门户（London Gateway）集装箱码头的计划设想了迄今为止最高程度的自动化，为英国提供了一个独特的机会，发展具有战略意义的自动化软件专业知识。该提案旨在开发基于鲁棒和随机优化方法的创新方法，以控制码头内集装箱的自动水平和垂直移动，并在原型控制软件中实施这些方法。鲁棒优化包括定义关键参数的间隔，如集装箱移动的开始时间和持续时间，然后寻找最小化参数实现的最大遗憾的解决方案。优化通过滚动规划范围考虑了未来事件。作为鲁棒优化的替代方案，随机优化通过情景分析来处理不确定性。在这种方法中，与系统组件/参数相关的不确定性由来自底层优化问题的许多场景（或子问题）建模，信息结构可以表示为树，每个场景对应于从树的根到叶子的路径。由于鲁棒和随机优化问题通常都是np困难的，因此将设计启发式方法以允许实时实现。在提供给英国港口运营商之前，原型控制软件将在模拟中进行测试。