Evolution of Freight Villages and Dry Ports from the Macro Logistics Perspective Based on European Benchmarking 2020

Being the initiator of the German and European Freight Village ranking, Deutsche GVZ-Gesellschaft (DGG) has the methodical know how to create the benchmarking studies. In this ranking approximately 100 Freight Village locations were analysed and evaluated. The research was based on the generation of an uniform understanding, which was focused on intermodality and the significant distinctive management structures. This data led to a qualitative and detailed overview. Because of the positive response, we were motivated to start the second ranking in 2015, as well as the update in 2019/2020. The results of the ranking show important basics and facts, which demonstrate the importance of the Freight Villages and strengthened their role as central, intermodal logistics nodes. Moreover, the responsible decision makers in the Freight Villages benefit from the results of the benchmarking. Many management companies use their placement in the ranking for public relations activities. Good placements or improvements are important instruments in marketing strategies.

Ports and logistics: resilience, sustainability and new centrality in the post-pandemic perspective for Italy and EU Med ports

<abstract> <p>This article is part of the Economic Geography studies and deals with aspects related to intermodal logistics with particular reference to maritime transport of containers. Ports are historically one of the key infrastructures for the Italian economy. In recent decades, along with many industrial sectors that were once driving forces for the national economy, due to the lack of adequate strategic planning, it has failed to keep pace with the rapid changes imposed on all sectors involved in the process of globalization of the economic world, losing ground and competitiveness with respect to many competing realities, both in Northern Europe and in the Mediterranean basin itself ^{[<xref ref-type="bibr" rid="b1">1</xref>]}. Most of the other states of Mediterranean Europe are in similar conditions, but Italy is probably the one that has lost the most ground. In this situation of strong economic and social imbalance, the covid-19 epidemic has hit Italy before and dramatically and if it had not turned into a pandemic, hitting the rest of Europe and the planet and forcing the European institutions to launch, for the first time, concrete support measures for all, would probably have represented a fatal shock for the Italian economy. By elaborating the information on statistical data and projections available in numerous international publications on the transport economy and more specifically on logistics, taking into account the reasons for the successes and failures of similar realities to the Italian one, the study offers food for thought on what to do immediately and in the future, taking advantage of the unique and unrepeatable opportunity constituted by the economic initiatives for the post-pandemic recovery, to remedy the lost ground by returning an adequate role to our world of maritime and port transport which can also be a driving force for the territory behind, avoiding ending up on the edge of the evolved world.</p> </abstract>

POLÍTICA DE PRECIFICAÇÃO DE GEE: impactos econômicos e ambientais na agrologística de grãos no Mato Grosso

Este trabalho busca analisar o quão determinante seriam as políticas precificação de emissões de gases do efeito estufa (GEE) na competividade logística agroindustrial no Brasil. Para isso, considerou dois projetos de infraestrutura logística em fase de pré-concessão, Ferrogrão e Ferrovia Paraense, visando o escoamento da produção de grãos no estado do Mato Grosso. Assim, determinando as áreas de influência não apenas por meio dos custos de transporte, bem como com a incorporação dos custos provenientes das emissões, as soluções logísticas intermodais, considerando os dois projetos, indicam que essas são as que apresentam potencial maior área de influência para captação das menores emissões GEE. Cenário esse corroborado, visto que, consideradas elevações no custo por tonelada de CO2 emitido, o escoamento por meio da Ferrogrão e da Ferrovia Paraense se tornariam maiores.Palavras-chave: Precificação. Emissões. Agronegócio. Logística. Grãos.GHG PRICING POLICY: economic and environmental impacts on grain agrologistics in Mato GrossoAbstractThis paper analyzes how crucial the pricing policies of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions would be in the agroindustrial logistic competitiveness in Brazil. Two transportation infrastructure projects are analyzed, Ferrogrão and Pará Railway. By determining the areas of influence not only through transportation costs, as well as the incorporation of emissions costs, intermodal logistics solutions, considering the two projects, indicate that these are the ones with the largest potential area of influence to capture the lowest GHG emissions. This is corroborated as, considering increases in the cost per ton of CO2 emitted, the flow through Ferrogrão and Pará Railway would become larger.Keywords: Pricing. Emissions. Agribusiness. Logistics. Grains.

Logistics of Low-Tonnage LNG

In recent years, there has been an increasing interest in liquefied natural gas (LNG) as a bunker fuel for ships. This is due to a number of reasons of environmental (reduction of sulfur emissions by v essels in accordance with MARPOL 73/78 international convention), economic (lower price of LNG compared to distillate fuels meeting MARPOL 73/78 requirements), technical and economic (reduction of maintenance costs of vessels and an increase in service life) character. These conclusions regarding LNG are applicable to vessels of various types intended for sea and river navigation. At the same time, the transition of river ships and coastal vessels to LNG bunkering is currently being restrained, including in Russia, by a number of reasons, one of which is weak logistics support for LNG delivery from production sites to vessel bunkering points. As a result, the development of LNG vessel bunkering market requires improvement of logistics for delivery of lowtonnage LNG, which can be carried out using several modes of transport. The objective of the study is to develop a practical algorithm for estimating the cost of LNG transportation for vessel bunkering, taking into account the characteristics of intermodal logistics. The research methodology is based on an analytical method based on a system-structural approach. At the example of Russia, an algorithm has been developed for choosing the optimal transport and technological scheme (TTS) for delivering lowtonnage LNG and operational and economic models for calculating the unit cost of transportation, storage and transshipment of LNG. Testing the models on the calculated routes allowed to estimate the cost of LNG transportation according to the options of transport and technological schemes for bulk and container delivery methods and draw conclusions. Moreover, the methodology used is to a large extent universal and allows using the proposed approaches for development of TTS in relation to other countries.

Intermodal Container Routing: Integrating Long-Haul Routing and Local Drayage Decisions

Intermodal logistics service providers decide on the routing of demand through their service network. Long-haul routing decisions determine the selected departure and arrival terminals for containers and imply corresponding drayage tasks. Traditionally, given these long-haul routes and fixed drayage tasks, drayage operations are planned in a second phase by establishing truck routes to transport containers to and from terminals by truck. In this paper, operational decisions on local drayage routing in large-volume freight regions with multiple terminals on the one hand, and intermodal long-haul routing on the other hand are merged into an integrated intermodal routing problem. Different long-haul routing decisions imply different drayage tasks to be performed and thus impact total trucking costs. The approach aims at reducing the number of road kilometres and increases bundling opportunities by maximising the long-haul capacity utilisation. In this way, it contributes to the modal shift towards intermodal transport and a more sustainable transport system. As a weekly planning horizon is used, a maximum daily active time and a minimum overnight’s rest are included for multi-day drayage routing. A large neighbourhood search heuristic is proposed to solve the integrated intermodal routing problem. This integrated planning approach provides decision support for routing customer orders throughout the intermodal network with the aim of minimising total transport costs and maximising capacity utilisation. Experiments show the added value of the integrated approach, which uses more information to make better-informed decisions and increase the capacity utilisation. The largest savings in trucking costs are obtained for clustered instances with demand characteristics closest to real-life cases. Finally, a real-life case study analyses the impact of tactical service network design decisions on the total operational costs.