Combining Geographic Information System (GIS) and Simulation for Crew Boat Scheduling

Abstract

This paper aims to describe how Geographic Information System (GIS) can be combined with simulation to develop crew boat scheduling to transport Offshore Oil and Gas employees from Offshore Living Quarter to different working locations (Remote Platforms) to timely meet operational demands while reducing cost and using minimal resources. The approach is to apply GIS to determine the appropriate routing and scheduling with a different number of vessels that will allow employees to reach the remote platforms on time. GIS suggests that, with the new routing and scheduling, the company can reduce the number of vessels. However, due to uncertainty in a number of employees to be transported to each location and the speed of vessels, it is unclear whether the fleet size and the routing recommended by GIS will still be valid. Therefore, a simulation model is needed to simulate the situation with a variable number of employees to be transported. This allows one to evaluate the fleet size and the routing recommended by GIS to ensure that it still provides an optimal solution in a realworld situation. The simulation result confirms that the company can reduce the number of vessels from 6 to 5 vessels and can still be able to meet the transportation required under the time constraints. The average vessel seating utilization increases from 87.0% to 97.8%. With the new routing and scheduling solution, the company can reduce transportation cost by 47 million baht per year.