IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/inm/orinte/v37y2007i4p342-352.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Steaming on Convex Hulls

Author

Listed:
  • Gerald G. Brown

    (Operations Research Department, Naval Postgraduate School, Monterey, California 93943)

  • Jeffrey E. Kline

    (Operations Research Department, Naval Postgraduate School, Monterey, California 93943)

  • Richard E. Rosenthal

    (Operations Research Department, Naval Postgraduate School, Monterey, California 93943)

  • Alan R. Washburn

    (Operations Research Department, Naval Postgraduate School, Monterey, California 93943)

Abstract

This is a sea story about using a simple classroom example to save a great deal of money, as well as to convince beginning Postgraduate Naval School operations research students---experienced, skeptical military officers---that mathematical analysis can yield immediate results. The application is planning a ship’s transit from one point to another in a fixed amount of time, given that the ship can operate with one or more of its propulsion plants idled to save fuel. Simple analysis yields nonintuitive results that US Navy shipboard energy-conservation guides overlook. One of the authors (Kline) solved this homework problem as a student and subsequently applied this example when he took command of USS AQUILA, a patrol hydrofoil missile ship. AQUILA achieved results so striking in comparison to her sister ships that the squadron material officer inspected her engineering plant to ensure that no safety settings were being overridden to achieve this record. Kline’s spreadsheet decision-support tool was provided to other hydrofoil commanders. A more general version has been conveyed to the US Navy. Considering that our navy spends about a billion dollars per year on fuel for surface-combatant ships alone, this development promises substantial, long-term returns. “But thou, contracted to thine own bright eyes, Feed'st thy light'st flame with self-substantial fuel.” Shakespeare, Sonnet I

Suggested Citation

  • Gerald G. Brown & Jeffrey E. Kline & Richard E. Rosenthal & Alan R. Washburn, 2007. "Steaming on Convex Hulls," Interfaces, INFORMS, vol. 37(4), pages 342-352, August.
  • Handle: RePEc:inm:orinte:v:37:y:2007:i:4:p:342-352
    DOI: 10.1287/inte.1070.0286
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1287/inte.1070.0286
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1287/inte.1070.0286?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. K Fagerholt & S I Heimdal & A Loktu, 2000. "Shortest path in the presence of obstacles: An application to ocean shipping," Journal of the Operational Research Society, Palgrave Macmillan;The OR Society, vol. 51(6), pages 683-688, June.
    2. Richard E. Rosenthal & William J. Walsh, 1996. "Optimizing Flight Operations for an Aircraft Carrier in Transit," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 44(2), pages 305-312, April.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Thomas Buckley Imhoff & Savvas Gkantonas & Epaminondas Mastorakos, 2021. "Analysing the Performance of Ammonia Powertrains in the Marine Environment," Energies, MDPI, vol. 14(21), pages 1-41, November.
    2. Gerald G. Brown & W. Matthew Carlyle, 2008. "Optimizing the US Navy's combat logistics force," Naval Research Logistics (NRL), John Wiley & Sons, vol. 55(8), pages 800-810, December.
    3. Gerald G. Brown & Walter C. DeGrange & Robert F. Dell & Ronald D. Fricker, 2015. "ASP, Art and Science of Practice: Educating Military Operations Research Practitioners," Interfaces, INFORMS, vol. 45(2), pages 175-186, April.
    4. D Ronen, 2011. "The effect of oil price on containership speed and fleet size," Journal of the Operational Research Society, Palgrave Macmillan;The OR Society, vol. 62(1), pages 211-216, January.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Andrzej Bochniak & Monika Stoma, 2021. "Estimating the Optimal Location for the Storage of Pellet Surplus," Energies, MDPI, vol. 14(20), pages 1-16, October.
    2. Alan Washburn & Gerald G. Brown, 2016. "An exact method for finding shortest routes on a sphere, avoiding obstacles," Naval Research Logistics (NRL), John Wiley & Sons, vol. 63(5), pages 374-385, August.
    3. Ari, Ibrahim & Aksakalli, Vural & Aydogˇdu, Volkan & Kum, Serdar, 2013. "Optimal ship navigation with safety distance and realistic turn constraints," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 229(3), pages 707-717.
    4. Marielle Christiansen & Kjetil Fagerholt & David Ronen, 2004. "Ship Routing and Scheduling: Status and Perspectives," Transportation Science, INFORMS, vol. 38(1), pages 1-18, February.
    5. Babel, Luitpold & Zimmermann, Thomas, 2015. "Planning safe navigation routes through mined waters," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 241(1), pages 99-108.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:inm:orinte:v:37:y:2007:i:4:p:342-352. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Chris Asher (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/inforea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.