Application of RFID Technology in Port Containers
1, RFID technology application background in the port container field
Under the background of the vigorous development of international trade in all countries, container transport is playing an increasingly important role in international shipping with its characteristics of high efficiency, safety, and convenience. In recent years, the domestic port container transport has developed rapidly. In 2006, Hong Kong, Shanghai, and Shenzhen ranked second, third, and fourth in world port container throughput, and annual throughput reached 22.23 million TEU, 21.71 million TEU, 18.47 million, respectively. TEU. Faced with such a huge container throughput, coupled with numerous international container transportation process links, how to achieve a more efficient, safe, and rapid turnover of container transportation is a real issue facing port-related companies.
The current status of domestic ports on container management is that the information collection of containers in the port area is basically completed manually or semi-automatically. The flow management, tracking and monitoring of the container supply chain is isolated, and the real-time accurate data is only 65%. After the container's circulation has collected dozens of times for manual collection of information, the efficiency is low, and the port automation cannot be realized. The port customs mainly identify the container's box number through image processing and pattern recognition technology. The recognition rate of this processing method is generally 80%. A 95%, for the customs officers, the workload is considerable. In this context, people turned their approach to Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) III. At present, this technology is using its unique technical advantages such as long-distance, non-contact, and automatic identification in sports, and is applied in the management of port containers.
2. Application Status of RFID Technology in Port Containers
2.1 The application of RFID technology in foreign countries has achieved certain progress in port container management. Foreign RFID manufacturers have developed RFID container related products, such as the United States Transeore Corporation developed the 860-960MHz electronic tag for the container AT5110; GE company The 2.45GHz container security device CSD and ICSD were developed. The 38 ports including Antwerp in Belgium, Vancouver in Canada, Port of Rotterdam in the Netherlands, France, Germany, and Italy have all participated in the “CSI†promoted by the United States. When the container is damaged in the port, the door is opened or delayed arrival and other unexpected circumstances occur, the port operator can receive the system's automatic alarm through the handheld terminal, the first time to understand the relevant circumstances.
2.2 The application of domestic RFID technology is still in the research and pilot phase of port container management. For example, Shanghai International Port Group Co., Ltd. has piloted the development of a container electronic tag and started under the strong support of Shanghai.
The construction of the domestic trade container electronic tag demonstration line has designed the first domestic port container smart tag system. There is also Shenzhen Yantian Port, which has been the first to be included in the Container Security Initiative (CSI). RFID technology has been applied to Yantian International's shore crane equipment, gates and berths, etc., and the goods that Yantian walks enjoy a safer inspection service, enabling goods to enter the European and American markets smoothly, quickly and safely.
3. Obstacles in the application of RFID technology in port container management
Although RFID technology has been piloted and researched in port container transportation, most of the world's ports have not yet been applied. This is far from enough in economic globalization. At present, the promotion of this technology is relatively slow. There are mainly the following obstacles:
3.1 RFID System Standard Issues
International standards have been introduced but have not been effectively promoted. National standards for automatic identification of domestic containers have not yet been introduced, which restricts manufacturers of domestic container automatic identification systems from developing related RFID technology hardware and software products. These products include container electronic tags, electronic license plates, readers, electronic locks and container back-office management systems. These products are the core products of RFID applications in port container management. In response to the application of RFID technology to container standards, the International Standardization Organization isofrc104 Container Technical Committee established in 1991 the TIS010374 "Container Automatic Identification" international standard foot. The national standard GBfr17894-1999 formulated by China in 1999 is equivalent to the IS010374 standard, but these two standards have not been effectively promoted.
3.2 Cost Issues
The application of RFID technology has brought about two inputs for port-related companies: first, purchase of REID-related equipment such as tags and readers, and second, the transformation and reinvestment of basic systems. At present, the investment in RFID systems is relatively large, and RFID technology is not used in large scale in port container transportation, resulting in a relatively high use cost of the technology in ports, which severely restricts the use of trading companies, customs, ports, and third-party logistics companies. RFID technology enthusiasm.
3.3 Security issues
The first is the security of the label content, followed by the location of the label. Container tags are reused many times and cannot fail during the entire life cycle of the container. After RFID tags are affixed to containers, although related information in the container transportation system can speed up information transfer and improve the overall quality of logistics services, it is possible that in the future through a simple electronic device, criminals can obtain electronic tags through wireless communication. Implicit information, and then use this information to obtain or destroy electronic tag passwords. Therefore, an RFID tag used in a container transportation system is intended to prevent non-system readers from reading, that is, the tag is capable of recognizing a reader, thereby deciding whether or not to send the information in the tag to the reader. Only by doing this will the transportation under the management of electronic containers be more secure.
3.4 Application Maturity of RFID Technology At present, the domestic application of REID technology in the port container field is still in the pilot and discussion stage. The relevant products are still immature, which directly causes customers to have considerable concerns about the use of this technology. Although a small number of REID vendors have developed RFID container related products, most of these products are used in demonstration projects in certain ports, and there is still a big gap compared with the real scale application.
3.5 Concept issues
There are significant differences in RFID attitudes among participants of RFID technology applications. The government and REID vendors, as direct beneficiaries of RFID, actively promote the use of RFID technology in a positive and optimistic manner. RFID-related customers such as traders, ports, and shipping companies as RFID consumers need to pay for the application of this technology. They are reluctant to be pioneers in the early days of technology promotion because the initial investment is even greater, and no successful model can be imitated. Conceptually, users who are innovative users of REID technology need to pay a high price, and the first people who eat crabs do not eat crabs but become jeopards who eat crabs. There are many customers who hold these two views. The customer's conceptual barriers to RFID technology have also become the embarrassment of RFID development.
4. Measures to promote the application of RFID technology in the port container sector
4.1 Based on RFID international standards, the international standards for the development and implementation of RFID standards for China's electronic container-related standards are mainly composed of standards for data collection and back-office database application systems. Currently released or under development is mainly related to data acquisition, such as the air interface of container electronic tags and readers, the data exchange protocol between readers and computers, and the encoding standards for RFID tag data. Background database network application system has not yet formed a real standard.
The advantage of directly using RFID technology standards is that it will save us time in researching and setting standards, but the downside is that once we adopt international standards, we have two problems: - Products derived from these international standards. It needs to pay hundreds of billions of dollars of high royalties. Second, the data security problems caused by the direct use of international standards cannot be ignored. Once foreign databases and servers are used, the country’s business information will have no secret. Great security risks. China, as a large container producer, is also the third largest container turnover country. The research and application of the labeling electronic label standard for containers will have an important impact on China’s import and export trade, container manufacturers, and RFID product manufacturers. influences.
Containers are internationally circulated transportation tools. The formulation of this standard requires consideration of international commonality, and we must also consider that we have a huge demand for RFID technology in port containers. To this end, China needs to formulate national standards related to electronic containers as soon as possible in order to protect the domestic RFID industry. At the same time, it also affects the revision of IS010374 so that it can be compatible with Chinese standards. The standard dispute is not a simple technical dispute, but rather a huge commercial interest and the battle for national business data security. Therefore, based on the international standards of RFID, it is necessary and urgent to formulate and implement a national standard for its own electronic containers.
4.2 Implementing RFID technology in pilot sites of important ports of container-related ports to promote the application of the technology in the port container field
The important nodes related to the container in the port are the storage and transportation center, container yard, terminal frontier and customs. These important nodes should jointly unite to pilot the implementation of electronic container management to form a coordinated management of container information within the region. For example, a set of RFID readers is set up at the container storage center. When containers with electronic tags leave the site, REID readers will read the container information they have read to the on-site server cabinet through the network communication system.
Two sets of RFID readers are set up in the container yard, which are the RFID access reader and the RFID monitoring reader in the yard. The RFID arrival reader set up by the port control center actively reads the container entry information with electronic tags. The RFID monitoring reader in the site can cooperate with the straddle carrier to carry out safety monitoring on the containers in the venue. A reader is set up on the Customs bayonet, and the bayonet host reads the electronic license plate, driver's card, data of the front box's electronic box number tag and electronic lock data of the rear box on the electronically-labeled container; the weight data is obtained through the electronic floor scale instrument. Through the box number identification module to obtain container image information and identify the box number. These data are transmitted by the bayonet host to the customs logistics monitoring platform via the network. Implementing electronic container management within the port scope can improve the accuracy and convenience of container logistics information collection, improve the efficiency of customs clearance, provide powerful conditions for improving the automation level of port operations, and also improve the information and transparency of the container logistics supply chain. Chemicals provide the basis.
4.3 Accelerate the R&D of RFID technology and industry promotion, reduce the application cost of RFID technology
The application of RFID technology in port container management is not only related to the mandatory requirements of government departments, implementation standards, corporate cooperation, and network improvement, but also related to the continuous improvement of RFID technology. At present, the research scope of electronic containers involves the research of products and standards, the research of application systems, and so on. What is even more crucial is to transform these research results into practical and feasible electronic container management systems for use in the port industry. With the increasing efforts of the RFID industry to test and test the container system at the port, the application of the electronic container system in the port has been accelerated. For example, in January 2005, General Electric's subsidiary GE Security issued a set of electronic systems for the container security market and completed the first commercial test of cross-sea transportation with CIMC.
At the same time, GE is installing RFID readers and software at ports around the world and is fully promoting the relevant technologies of smart container systems in an effort to make these technologies a new standard for the container industry. We believe that with the joint efforts of the industry, the application of RFID in the port will gradually reduce the use cost of customers as the technology continues to mature. With the continuous improvement of RFID technology, the use of RFID technology in the port container industry will surely become more and more alike due to strong customer demand.
4.4 Gradual implementation of RFID technology in stages at important ports
The world's leading consulting firm Gartner uses RFID technology to divide enterprises into three phases. The first phase is the adoption of RFID technology within the company. The purpose of the application is to verify that RFID can be used in certain environments of a particular company; and the second phase is the integration of RFID by enterprises. The technology and existing business processes, but only as a complete and complementary RFID application as the original business system, using new technologies to adapt to traditional applications; the third phase is to design business processes based on RFID technology, optimize the existing Business processes eliminate manual processes and improve information automation.
With reference to Gartner's three-stage theory of using RFID technology in enterprises, the introduction of RFID technology in the field of port container management can also be divided into three stages. The first stage is to introduce RFID technology into the container management at the port yard to realize the importance of the port. Nodes monitor, control, and track containers. In the second phase, the information system of the port-related companies was reconstructed, and a container back-office management information system adapted to RFID technology was established. After the data collection was performed using the RFID system, the automatic management of container information was realized. In the third phase, the port-related companies and government functional departments jointly participated in the RFID system and used the RFID technology as the core to optimize the container information processing business of the existing port nodes, eliminate manual processes, and truly realize the automated management of the port containers.
5. Benefits of Applying RFID Technology in Port Containers
5.1 Improve the efficiency of container management. Save container loading and unloading and circulation time RFID technology is used in the management of port yards to automatically collect container data in and out of the yard to improve the speed and accuracy of container handling at the terminal. All trailers and trailers at the freight yard are RFID-tagged, which fully automates the container data collection process. Through this system, the container on the radio frequency tag trailer can be instantly identified and its location can be confirmed. This measure will effectively reduce the loading and unloading time of containers.
5.2 Increase the speed of customs clearance. Improve the level of customs supervision
The RFID system is applied to bays, docks, yards, bonded areas, export supervised warehouses, land ports, and other locations of the customs. The combination of RFID technology and image recognition technology improves the recognition rate of box numbers and greatly reduces the number of box numbers. The workload reduces the workload of customs supervisors. According to relevant enterprise tests, RFID system efficiency can be increased by more than 20%, and customs clearance speed can be increased by more than 30%.
5.3 For port-related companies such as shippers, container transport companies, etc., they can also benefit from the application of RFID technology. The owners and container transport companies, through the application of RFID technology, can track the information of the container in real time and use the network communication system to promptly use the container. The cargo information is passed to the owner, allowing the owner to know the latest information of the cargo in real time. The application of this technology will lay a good foundation for the informationization and transparency of the container logistics supply chain.
6 Conclusion
RFID is applied in the port container field. Although there are obstacles of this kind or other, it represents the development direction of containerization in the world's ports. Its application trend is irreversible. Its application makes up for the insufficiency of traditional container information management, realizes automatic container identification and real-time tracking of the container transportation process, enhances the safety of container transportation, improves the turnover rate of port containers, and greatly accelerates the speed of container clearance. The construction of a digital container port with international advanced level indicates the development path.