Load-In-Load-Out AGV Route Planning in Automatic Container Terminal

Efficient automatic guided vehicle (AGV) scheduling is the key to increase the throughput of automated container terminals. Traditional transport strategies cannot guarantee that AGVs are fully loaded during their traveling between the dock and the container yard, which leads to the insufficient utilization of AGVs. A load-in-load-out AGV route planning mode provides two-way loading between the dock and the container yard and thus improves the efficiency of container terminals. In this paper, a load-in-load-out AGV route planning model is designed with the help of a buffer zone where an AGV can carry at most two containers. A simulated annealing algorithm is used to solve it. Comparisons with the popular generic algorithm and particle swarm algorithm are made. Simulation results show that the proposed algorithm can effectively solve the problem and realize the bi-directional loading of AGVs, which is of great significance to improve the efficiency of the production of automated container terminals.