US-based engineering firm Casper, Phillips & Associates (CP&A) has been instrumental in developing a Site Wind Analysis and Monitor (SWAM) programme for Global Container Terminals (GCT), utilising anemometers and weather forecasting technology.
The new system has been nominated for an industry award.
GCT’s Deltaport, a container terminal in Canada, is located at Roberts Bank in Delta, British Columbia. The 210-acre facility features a 3,609ft contiguous berth and a dock rail with 27,350ft of tracks, accommodating over 18,000 containers at any time.
The terminal faces significant wind exposure from the Pacific Ocean via the Strait of Juan de Fuca, necessitating a refined wind policy. Previously, the port management had no clear guidelines, resulting in unplanned shutdowns that affected operations, customer service, and safety.
CP&A, which provides services such as procurement, specification, design, manufacturing review, modification, and accident investigation, was tasked with reviewing the wind policy. The focus was on stacks of empty containers, which, due to changes in yard planning, could no longer be isolated, posing risks of falling into roadways and creating hazards.
CP&A mechanical engineer Richard Phillips said: “The heavier the containers, the higher the wind force required to move them. The lighter the containers, the easier it is to push the stack over.
“We discovered that the safe shutdown wind speed varied greatly depending on how the containers were stacked, which led us to propose creating either a stacking policy or using the TOS [terminal operating system] to calculate a real-time safe wind speed based on how the containers were stacked and their weights. GCT chose the latter.”
The company developed back-end programming that incorporated engineering analysis and mathematics. It was discovered that the port’s rubber-tired gantry (RTG) cranes had manufacturer-set shutdown speeds, regardless of their location in the yard.
Additionally, the cranes, sourced from various manufacturers, had anemometers at different heights. CP&A proposed a separate array of anemometers to measure wind speed near the containers.
GCT managed the front-end programming, including the user interface and display graphics, and contracted the installation of the anemometer array designed by CP&A.
The project underwent a trial period to ensure the new system accurately assessed the risk of containers sliding or tipping. This phase also evaluated the precision of weather forecasting research conducted by the University of British Columbia.
Phillips added: “Typically, anemometers are installed at a height of 33ft. However, the standard height would not be ideal for this application since the tallest RTGs are 89ft tall. We designed a bolt-on array that connected to the existing light poles at a height of 98ft.
“Each array has three anemometers, 120 degrees apart. Based on the direction of the wind, only two anemometers are considered valid since one of them will likely be shielded by the light pole. We chose three because if one anemometer goes down, there will be at least one good anemometer per array.”
