Abstract:

Ports that handle massive container ships play a pivotal role in global logistics and supply chain operations. These ports provide essential services for managing and accommodating the large container vessels. When a container ship arrives at a port, it requires the assistance of powerful tugboats to aid in critical maneuvering. These tugboat operations are crucial for safely docking the ship at its designated berth, repositioning or shifting the vessel within the port area, and undocking or allowing the ship to depart from the berth. The efficient scheduling of tugboats to serve these vessels is essential to ensure the safe and smooth movement of container ships during their time at the port. This research examines the tugboat scheduling problem (Tug-SP), focusing on reviewing literature to identify variables for optimizing tugboat operations. It proposes incorporating horsepower capacity constraints and conducts numerical experiments to demonstrate the practical significance of the developed models using historical port data from a major maritime hub in Southeast Asia. The findings revealed no substantial discrepancy between the projected scenarios and the historical data. Future research could explore more dynamic problems, solve larger and more complicated cases, design more efficient solution methods, and use appropriate algorithms. Additionally, other factors such as uncertainty in ship arrival times or specific situations could be considered as variables to minimize total tugboat service time or reduce operational costs, especially for large and busy container ports.