Performance of ship queuing rules at coal export terminals

Shipping of bulk products such as coal, ore, grain and petrochemical products is an important part of maritime logistics. We study the port operations at two coal export terminals that have experienced substantial queuing in recent years. Both terminals are operated by a single port operator and service ships that come to pick up different brands of coal. The present work is part of a larger study to meet throughput requirements while achieving acceptable ship waiting times before being loaded. We focus our analysis on priority rules of how ships are routed into berths from a queue outside the terminals. Discrete-event simulation was used to understand the effect of using different rules for routing ships at various throughput requirements. The simulation model considered scheduled and unplanned breakdowns of loading machines, the influence of ship age on loading rates and product unavailability at the port. Performance profiles are generated for each rule.