Study On Ultra Large Container Ships And Terminals Development

Based on the analysis of the container liners' marine transportation costs whichare related with the scale of the container ships, by dividing the costs into two parts:daily fixed costs per TEU and shipping costs per TEU per mile, this paper calculatesthe different costs per TEU on the conditions of different lines, different ship scalesand different loading/unloading efficency. The results show that container ships underthe scale of 4000TEU can gain apparent scale economy from the enlargement of theships, but the larger the ships are, the slower the costs go down. If the lines are longenough and the efficency of the loading/unloading process can be guaranteed, ultralarge container ships of Malaccamax which can hold 18000TEU are still able to takeadvantages of scale economy. The emergence of ultra large container ships willinevitably have great impacts on the existing container terminals. The low efficencyof the loading/unloading process, the inefficiency of the container flows betweenports and their hinterlands and the lack of enough container yard space will becomethe bottle neck of the whole container transportation chain. So the development of theultra large container ships will spur the development of container terminals.This paper describes the trends of the container terminal equipments and theoperation and management system, and then gives a blueprint of an ultra largecontainer terminal according to the dimensions of 18000TEU container ship and codefor design of general layout of see ports. Under the condition of the existing terminalefficency, an 18000TEU container terminal should have an inland depth of 1000m atleast.Finally this paper present a simulation of the working process based on thegiven blueprint of an 18000TEU container terminal using Circle Operation Network.The results show that such terminals should have a set of equipments of 6 QCs (quaycrane) 14 RMGs and 34-38 ITs (internal truck). QC: RMG: IT should be around1:2.3:6.