Analysis on supply capability in seaborne-coal supply logistics system

Most of the big power plants locate at the coastal areas in order to get fuel by sea-borne transport (SBT). Power plant can be benefited from the SBT of shipping large quantities of cargo in one hand, but has to suffer the inaccurate delivery schedule on the other. Inaccurate delivery time of SBT is likely caused by heavy weather en route or the misarranging of loading or discharging operations and will definitely affect the normal production of the power plant. Early bird ships may bring huge amount of demurrage and late delivery of fuel will definitely arise extremely high shortage cost. Yet, the variation and uncertainty of delivery cannot be eliminated thoroughly in the SBT, and the sole requirement is to improve the supplying capability of the sea-borne supply chain. This paper tries to simulate the SBT by means of WITNESS software, analyze and evaluate the capability of sea-borne fuel supply chain of a power plant. The results can be used both in improving the capability of SBT and the optimization of resources allocation of the sea-borne fuel supply chain.