Marine inventory routing: shipments planning

This paper addresses a shipments-planning problem faced by producers of large volume liquid bulk products. Producing origins with limited tank storage capacity supply multiple products by ships (or barges) to consuming destinations that also have limited storage capacity. Timing, origin, destination, and product quantities of shipments have to be determined in a manner that minimizes costs and does not violate storage capacity constraints at both ends (neither stopping production at the origins, nor running out of stock at the destinations). A mixed integer-programming model is used to derive cost effective solutions within a few minutes. A cost-based heuristic algorithm is used to assure that acceptable solutions are obtained quickly.