Terminal Planning and Simulation Study for Wando Welch Terminal

The Challenge

The Wando Welch Terminal (WWT) has experienced steadily increasing throughput volumes in recent years and is expected to reach its capacity limit very soon. At the same time, most of the top lifters, which are used for stacking of export containers, are coming to the end of their technical lifetime. Against this background, HPC has been approached to develop and analyse different development options for WWT by simulation, which increase storage capacity through densified yard arrangement and the use of more space efficient RTGs. During the execution of the study, a new automated gate system was put into operation at WWT without yielding the expected improvements. Therefore, HPC’s study was extended to analyse the gate system, identifying short term improvement measures and determining long-term development requirements.

Tasks Performed

• Development of three layout alternatives for WWT, boosting storage capacity on given footprint by more than 40%
• Planning of associated equipment and resource requirements
• Implementation of tailored WWT terminal simulation model
• Validation and analysis of alternative layouts through simulation experiments
• Refinement of layout alternatives based on simulation results
• Development of staged phasing concept for layout alternatives
• Analysis and comparison of investment and operating cost per alternative
• Detailed analysis of automated gate system
• Identification of short term improvement measures in gate infrastructure, operations and IT
• Simulation-based analysis of long-term gate requirements

Benefit 

• Developed yard storage strategy, boosting terminal capacity
• Determined most efficient yard layout for future terminal operations
• Iidentified short and longterm improvement measures to improve gate operations