Future Environmental Policy Decision-Making for Preliminary Ship Design using Markov Decision Processes

摘要

Ship design is no stranger to environmental regulation, as vessels are subject to policies ranging from hazardous waste containment to ballast water management. Design for the environment (DfE) measures employ systems-thinking analysis to moderate impacts of a product's life cycle on the environment. However, significant uncertainty may exist in early-stage design with regards to manufacturing, operation, and disposal activities. Therefore, future policies governing the environmental aspects of ship design must be robust and carefully structured to ensure social welfare benefits are maximized. The purpose of this research is to establish a methodology for evaluating the design of a small ship subsystem contingent to uncertain future environmentalpolicies. The authors discuss preliminary research on the use of a multi-agent Markov Decision Process (MDP) intended to link preliminary design to future policy development.