Multi-objective simultaneous stowage and load planning for a container ship with container rehandle in yard stacks

The efficiency of a maritime container terminal primarily depends on the smooth and orderly process of handling containers, especially during the ship s loading process. The stowage and associated loading plans are mainly determined by two criteria: ship stability and the minimum number of container rehandles required. The latter is based on the fact that most container ships have a cellular structure and that export containers are piled up in a yard. These two basic criteria are often in conflict. This paper is concerned with the ship s container stowage and loading plans that satisfy these two criteria. The GM, list and trim are taken into account for the stability measurements. The problem is formulated as a multi-objective integer programming. In order to obtain a set of noninferior solutions of the problem, the weighting method is employed. A wide variety of numerical experiments demonstrated that solutions by this formulation are useful and applicable in practice. 2004 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.