Logistics and Economics of Autonomous Vessels

AutoLog aims at identifying and analysing opportunities created by autonomous vessels in the delivery of services. In our analysis, we combine tools from logistics, economics, and digital technology. In particular, AutoLog focuses on new opportunities in two areas: flexible lane design and scheduling, and economics of deep-sea cargo shipping. Presently, liner shipping cargo services and (primarily local) public passenger transport services use fixed lanes and schedules on the basis of anticipated demand. Passengers and cargo shippers must, therefore, adapt to these fixed lanes and schedules. Autonomous vessels (including mixed fleets) create possibilities for changing this paradigm and make lanes and schedules adapt to passengers' and shippers' preferences. We assess how companies and users can benefit in this context. The benefits can be due to an enlarged coverage area or a better match between supply and demand, blurring the distinction between scheduled and on-demand transportation. We mostly study these questions under the umbrella of the 'Blue Light Rail' project in Bergen. This is a project under The City of Bergen, Vestland County and Bergen Chamber of Commerce. The project is about using small autonomous (and electrical) vessels for local transportation in Bergen in order to utilize the fact that that many parts of the city are very close to each other by boat, but far away from each other by car or bus due to the topology of the city. Most of the past literature on autonomous ships has focused on safety and design issues. To compare with autonomous cars, we have published a literature review where we compared cars and vessels.The differences are striking. In particular, while there is quite a bit on the logistics of autonomous cars, there is almost nothing on logistics for autonomous vessels. This gives some directions for our work. The review articles has been published. Although the focus of our project is on vessels, we also look at other autonomous transport modes. This is because we are interested to learn from experiences with other autonomous modes what is relevant for autonomous vessels and, second, because we foresee that there will be a natural interaction between different modes of transport in autonomous logistics systems in the near future. Second, the introduction of autonomous vessels in deep-sea cargo transport is, from an economic point of view, mainly an issue of cost competitiveness versus traditional manned designs. We perform economic analysis of certain vessel types on selected international trades. The key trade-offs will be the initial higher capital cost of unmanned autonomous vessels due to the need for redundancy and low-maintenance designs versus the potentially lower operating costs, increased service levels and higher cargo intake for the same main dimensions.

Faglig har prosjektet økt kunnskapen om hvordan logistikken endres når autonomi innføres ut over at faste kostnader går opp og variable kostnader ned. Den viktigste virkningen er at prosjektet har øket kunnskapen vi har om autonomi, noe som påvirker både forskning, undervisning og veiledning. Vi har også brakt denne kunnskapen ut til andre logistikkmiljøer gjennom foredrag og publikasjoner. Det at fartøyene har praktisk talt null i driftskostnader når de ligger i ro gjør at man lokalt kan ha mye mer fleksible transporttilbud, samt at skillet mellom taxi og rutebåt viskes ut. Fravær av mannskap øker fleksibiliteten fordi man ikke lenger er bundet av arbeidstidsbestemmelser. Når fartøyene ikke er i bruk kan de ligge på strategisk viktige steder som ikke nødvendigvis er lett tilgjengelige. Det siste kan være viktig for utrykningsfartøy av ulike slag. Det er viktig at brukere skjønner dette når autonomi vurderes slik at man fult ut utnytter teknologiens fortrinn. Tenker man seg at autonome fartøy er som tradisjonelle fartøy, bare uten mannskap, mister man mye viktig kunnskap. For større, havgående skip har vi identifisert to hovedutfordringer i forbindelse med implementering av autonomi. Den ene er at autonome skip ikke fungerer optimalt som en del av et ikke-autonomt logistikksystem. Eksempelvis er det nødvendig med autonome systemer i havn for navigasjon, fortøyning og lastbehandling, noe som medfører betydelige investeringer i ny infrastruktur. Den andre går på avveiningen mellom ytre dimensjoner på skipet (som driver energiforbruk) og lastekapasitet når elementer som har med menneskelig tilstedeværelse å gjøre fjernes fra skipets design (f.eks. skipets bro, lugarer osb.). Forskningen vår indikerer at miljøaspektet for ubemannede, autonome skip (d.v.s. utslipp per tonnmil) drives primært av at man kan ha et høyere lasteinntak for gitte skipsdimensjoner. Virkningene av dette er todelt: 1) At det er behov for tverrfaglig samarbeid på tvers av forvaltningsorganer og forskermiljøer som har ansvar for havn og sjø med tanke på politisk og praktisk implementering av autonome maritime systemer og 2) at praktisk skipsdesign bør fokusere på å optimalisere utnyttelsen av volum og vekt for ubemannede skip. Effekten på et samfunnsnivå er at politiske organer og forskningsinstitusjoner bør se utviklingen av maritime autonome logistikksystemer som en helhet heller enn en eksersis i design og teknologisk utvikling av enkeltskip som er tendensen til nå.

AutoLog aims at identifying and analysing opportunities created by autonomous vessels in the delivery of services. In our analysis, we combine tools from logistics, economics, and digital technology. In particular, AutoLog focuses on new opportunities in three areas: flexible lane design and scheduling, emergency medical services (EMS), and economics of deep-sea cargo shipping. With traditional manned vessels, liner shipping cargo services and (primarily local) public passenger transport services use fixed lanes and schedules on the basis of anticipated demand. Passengers and cargo shippers must, therefore, adapt to fixed lanes and schedules. Autonomous vessels create possibilities for changing this paradigm and make lanes and schedules adapt to passengers' and shippers' preferences. We assess how companies and users can benefit in this context. The benefits can be due to an enlarged coverage area and because of a better match between supply and demand. Second, we foresee autonomous vessels as a technological advancement to ameliorate the burden that EMS staffing places in the case of boat ambulances, and to improve the planning of the system. The project will address the problem of locating ambulance vessels to potential sites given a required service level, which is typically measure as the response time and geographical coverage in sparsely populated areas. This is particularly important in regions like Northern Norway. Third, the introduction of autonomous vessels in deep-sea cargo transport is, from an economic point of view, mainly an issue of cost competitiveness versus traditional manned designs. We will perform economic analysis of the two vessel types on selected international trades. The key trade-offs will be the initial higher capital cost of unmanned autonomous vessels due to the need for redundancy and low-maintenance designs versus the potentially lower operating costs and higher cargo intake for the same main dimensions.