Improving energy efficiency of passive temperature-controlled transports: Design of a rule-based expert system

A significant proportion of the national and international flow of goods is transported and handled temperature-controlled. The passive temperature control follows without cooling or heating by means of aggregates, the goods must be located within a certain temperature range during the transport. Setting the temperature is currently based on experience, using information like the transport time and the condition of the transport container or weather conditions such as outdoor temperature, wind speed and density of precipitation. This paper proposes a design of a rule-based expert system that improves the energy efficiency of passive temperature-controlled transports. A rule based expert system is developed and implemented in a software application. This system supports shippers and logistics service providers in their decision on the starting temperature of the transported goods. The system predicts the optimum temperature for specific applications based on current factors such as material properties or transport and weather conditions. For that it uses fuzzy logic rules, which are created by combining the methodology of fuzzy logic and decision trees.