As published on the 3DS blog, this article was written by Dr. Debdeep Banerjee, AI & Optimization Specialist | Supply Chain Decision Intelligence | Scenario Modelling & Mathematical Optimization | Senior Presales Leader at Dassault Systèmes.
With global fuel supply networks fragile and constantly shifting, you need modern logistics planning. That means continuous replanning, realistic constraints, and thorough scenario evaluation. This article explores the evolving nature of these networks and provides actionable steps to help you transform a chaotic process into a production-ready Minimum Viable Product (MVP) in just four weeks.
Planning Fuel Logistics During Endless Disruptions
Fuel supply networks operate in a vastly more exposed environment than they did just a few years ago. Recent disruptions across critical maritime energy corridors demonstrate exactly how quickly routing, inventory positions, freight economics and supply continuity break down when a single point of instability ripples across the wider network.
Consider that roughly one-fifth of global crude, refined products and Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) trade normally passes through one such critical corridor. Recent disruptions there have sharply raised oil price forecasts, freight costs and insurance premiums. While this is clearly a geopolitical story, it’s equally a logistics planning problem.
Fuel operators now face an almost unlimited range of interacting variables. Vessel delays, demand swings, inventory constraints, charter cost inflation, labor rules and weather bottlenecks don’t arrive one at a time. They arrive together. You can’t build resilience by creating a single efficient plan and hoping conditions hold. Resilience comes from testing many scenarios, understanding trade-offs quickly and reworking your plan while operations are still moving.
With global fuel supply networks fragile and constantly shifting, you need modern logistics planning. That means continuous replanning, realistic constraints, and thorough scenario evaluation. This article explores the evolving nature of these networks and provides actionable steps to help you transform a chaotic process into a production-ready Minimum Viable Product (MVP) in just four weeks.
A Highly Volatile Operating Model
The traditional planning model assumed a manageable amount of uncertainty. Transport plans were created in batches, dispatch windows remained relatively stable and dispatchers handled exceptions manually. That model is now breaking under immense strain.
Recent events in key energy shipping lanes have forced insurers, charterers and traders to reprice risk rapidly. Hull war-risk premiums recently rose from about 0.25% to around 3%, translating into millions of dollars in additional costs per vessel. Freight rates for LNG tankers also jumped sharply as supply and routing patterns fractured.
For planners, the core issue goes beyond cost inflation. The real danger is how disruption propagates. A delay at sea shifts berth timing. That delay affects terminal throughput, which changes inventory availability. Planners must then make entirely different routing decisions inland, often under tighter service windows and with fewer usable resources. A localized disruption becomes a massive network problem in a matter of hours.
The Multiplier Effect of Possible Disruptions
Planners spend most of their time maintaining data rather than making decisions. When a disruption hits, the response is manual and slow. Scenarios are not evaluated, they are guessed. And because the plan lives in a file rather than a system, every handoff between teams introduces another opportunity for something to go wrong.
Take fuel distribution. It always involves complexity. However, the current challenge lies in the sheer volume of variable combinations you must consider before making a decision. You’re rarely dealing with a single isolated event.
A logistics planner might need to account for all the following factors simultaneously:
Reduced flow through a major transit corridor
Sudden jumps in freight or insurance costs
Inventory dropping toward a minimum threshold at one depot while another holds excess
Changes in customer priority or allocation rules
Shortages in compatible trailers or certified drivers
Strict labor and rest-hour compliance constraints
Low-emission or access restrictions in final-mile delivery zones
Weather or port congestion altering arrival times
Geopolitical turmoil changing route viability overnight
I explore these disruption patterns and their operational impact in more detail in our latest e-Book on fuel logistics resilience.
No single static model can capture all of this in advance. Success depends on your ability to generate, compare and refine many possible scenarios rapidly. Organizations that respond quickly to disruptions are not faster because they have better reflexes. They are faster because they have already modeled the disruption before it happened. When the event occurs, they are selecting from a set of pre-evaluated options, not starting an analysis from scratch.
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