Evaluation of Smartness Level in Local Maritime Ports

Abstract

Maritime transports are playing an increasing crucial role in the worldwide trade. The maritime ports are the core elements of these transport network. Any malfunctions in the ports could dramatically affect the performance of the entire network. Thus, a certain level of smartness or intelligence is required. In the same paradigm of smart cities, smart maritime networks are envisaged to make an optimal use of different resources, such spaces, machines, quays, energy resources, containers, etc. In this paper, we analyze the smartness level of some Moroccan ports. This study has been initialized, because Morocco is playing an increasing role as gate between Europe and Africa, and also as a hub for the world maritime transport. Smart maritime port is seen as a special smart environment case, categorized between smart cities and smart buildings. Therefore, the measure of the metric of smartness level is derived from the smart readiness indicators from these two special smart environments. Such indicator should serve as an instrument for the different players to defend their interests. For example, a national government could impose a certain level of smartness, where the environment protection and energy efficiency have more weight, and check how far the port authority protect the national interests. A mathematical model is used to generate numerical results for some local port use cases.