IPIC 2017 Contributions - Research paper

To achieve socio-economic and environmental sustainability, utilization of existing capacities and assets has become a key challenge for the transportation sector. New concepts such as the Physical Internet and synchromodality offer an alternative to the current “business as usual” setting of freight transport services. In this paper, we thus start by conceptualizing the Physical Internet (PI) and synchromodal transport where we examine the state-of-the-art models together with their designs and methodologies proposed in the scientific literature. This is to assess and explore possible correlations between these two concepts to understand how they can reinforce each other. The assessment results in a more unified vision of the freight transport research. The focus of our second objective is on synchromodality, where we translate the PI methodological approaches into a new conceptual framework for synchromodal transport modelling. Given the analytical nature of all synchromodal transport models, the authors intend to induce a paradigm shift; a different way of thinking about the modelling philosophy related to synchromodality. The underlying elements of our approach are multi-agent technology and GIS.

The issues outlined as follow are based on results of the ACCIA project which have been manifold, due to its being a subject formatting study. By summarising these results, first a documentation of the field of airfreight based on introductory literature and an exploration of official statistical sources on airfreight traffic are given. Subsequently, a deeper analysis of the airports investigated will be shown, whereby essential information was gained on exploratory field visits and by expert discussions on-site. All these insights into air cargo handling and transportation are essential for identifying and characterising the interfaces along the several airfreight transport chains. Based on this information, methodological approaches for analysing the processes along the air cargo transport chains are outlined. Finally, these procedures lead from the interfaces detected to determining application fields on to potential targets for identifying Research, Technology and Innovation RTI-potential. Ultimately, comments are made on these perspectives as to their significance for the future. The interface navigator developed as part of the study can serve as a basis for the step by step implementation of a physical internet along the complex air cargo transport chain.

This paper deals with smart locker banks for pickup and delivery in the context of omnichannel business-to-consumer logistics and supply chains. Its main contribution is the conceptualization of hyperconnected smart lockers network designs as an alternative to home delivery for enabling to meet the challenges toward efficiently and sustainably achieving fast and convenient business-to-consumer pickups and deliveries. It gradually explores alternative designs from current practices to solutions exploiting Physical Internet concepts (PI) such as the PI handling containers. The paper identifies key relative advantages and disadvantages of alternative solutions, synthesizes strategic insights for industry, and provides research challenges and opportunities.

Blockchain technology receives a lot of interest and investments the last three years. It promises a trusted environment for (un)permissioned data sharing. With respect to logistics, enterprises and authorities can (near) real time share state information. Whenever a stakeholder changes the state of one or more objects like discharging a container from a vessel, all that have access will know this change instantaneously. The Physical Internet requires a large variety of stakeholders to optimize their capacity utilization and combine shipments with the objective to reduce costs and emissions compliant with (inter)national regulations. These stakeholders all need to collaborate and share data to reach these objectives. This contribution shows by means of a case that blockchain supports functional requirements for hyperconnectivity, but is not yet mature enough for large scale application by a large number of (autonomous) objects, individuals, and organizations.

Deployment through hyperconnected distribution and fulfillment networks that are proposed in Physical Internet exploits openly shared logistic centers at all levels. This paper focuses on the hyperconnected mixing center (MC) from which multiple manufacturers store and consolidate goods to serve retailer distribution centers (DCs). Compared to current logistics services based on plant warehouses or dedicated MCs, the hyperconnected storage and shipping service offered from the hyperconnected MC can potentially improve the efficiency of logistic operations of its clients and respective retailers served by them significantly. However, the size of the benefit can vary by numerous factors such as client sets of the MC. In the perspective of a logistic service provider aiming to implement a hyperconnected MC, we propose a generic simulation-based methodology to assess the capacity requirement and service capabilities of the MC and illustrate the operations of a hyperconnected MC with empirical study.

The current way that supply chains move, handle, store, realize and supply physical objects is unsustainable. To significantly improve supply chain sustainability worldwide, the Physical Internet was proposed as a paradigm breaking model for how supply chains should operate. This new system takes advantage of open flow consolidation across multiple parties in hyperconnected hubs to produce fuller truckloads, and more optimal routes with respect to social, economic and environmental objectives. As can be seen, hyperconnected hub networks are central to the Physical Internet. But, how will modular containers flow through them? How will each hub communicate with the other players in the system? How will demand be split between competing hubs? These are the types of questions that will need answers so that the hubs and the Physical Internet can become a reality on a large scale. In this paper, we exploit a previously developed hub design and create a simulation model in order to examine how different hubs would interact in a competitive environment.

Coloured Petri Nets can be a valuable and powerful tool to design, analyse, and control the subsystems composing the Physical Internet, as they are able to capture the precedence relations and interactions among events which characterize the facilities and infrastructures (multimodal logistics centres and hubs, transit centres, roads and railways) through which p-containers are delivered. In this paper, the use of Coloured Petri Nets in the field of the Physical Internet is discussed and an example of the application of such a modelling tool to a multimodal hub in the PI is provided. The multimodal hub consists of four areas: a port area at which vessels arrive and depart, a train terminal for rail transportation, a road terminal for truck-to-X (and vice-versa) transhipment, and a storage area. The storage area and the road terminal are considered in detail, and two nets representing a section of a PI conveyor and a PI sorter/PI composer are proposed to illustrate the applicability of the CPN formalism to the Physical Internet paradigm.

This paper focuses on Resource Requirements Planning (RRP) for hyperconnected supply chain. The objective is to enable Physical Internet (PI) Logistics Web actors to plan their resources effectively to be able to fulfill the demand in the forthcoming years. We first identify a lack of research literature about RRP for hyperconnected supply chains. We conclude from our literature review that the research efforts done by the PI community are focused on enabling the PI to become operational. But the PI community has not yet shown any interest in PI strategic planning. So, we position our research regarding the MRP II system’s RRP, focusing on the strategic planning processes for production and capacity control. Therefore, from the lack of research literature about RRP for hyperconnected supply chains, and from the MRP II strategic planning methodology structure, we demonstrate the significant need to adapt this MRP II system’s RRP to fit the hyperconnected supply chains requirements and so the PI requirements. Finally, we introduce a Physical Internet Resource Requirement Planning (PI-RRP) methodology corresponding to our research agenda guidelines. The development of this methodology will drive our futures researches.

Expectations are high that the Physical Internet (PI) will contribute substantially to the improvement of transport chains’ efficiency and therefore to a swift reduction of freight transport related emissions. However, the PI’s ecological superiority still needs to be proven in reality. Moreover, in a synchro modal hyper-network, where routing management is decentralized, mechanisms need to be implemented that support emission minimization, both for individual flows as well as on a systems level. A standardized emission calculation tool for measuring emissions of freight transport chains ex-ante as well as ex-post is therefore necessary. Over the past decade, various approaches toward such a standard have been developed. This paper analyzes whether the currently existing approaches of emission calculation standardization are able to provide the necessary evaluations and whether they are equally able to support a successful steering of transport within the PI, so that lower emissions of freight transport can be realized compared to today’s freight transport system. Based on an overview of the basic principles of the PI and on a summary of the status of transport chain emission standardization approaches, the paper analyzes how far these two developments are fully compatible already and which major gaps still need to be closed.