Cement transportation planning via fuzzy linear programming

The mining of more than ten million tons of limestone for cement production in western Taiwan will be prohibited by the end of 1997 and hence almost half of the cement production will move toward eastern Taiwan. Since the supply and demand will be separated by the Central Ridge, the planning of transportation networks and facilities for limestone and cement appears urgent. This research resolves the cement transportation planning problem using fuzzy linear programming methods. Three types of fuzzy linear programming models are used to determine the optimal transportation amount and the capacity of new facilities. The emphasis is also on how to formulate a transportation planning problem where the port capacity, demand fulfillment, trans-shipping operation capacity and traffic congestion constraints are included. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.