Workshop on AI-powered Automation in Ports; Piscataway, New Jersey; Spring 2026

The grant supports a workshop that will identify the challenges and risks involved in building AI-powered innovations in US ports, ultimately making the US more economically competitive. World trade depends heavily on the marine transportation system: Over 80 percent of world trade volume is carried by sea. Seaports handle a vast majority of international cargo and are critical links in global supply chains. With increasing world-wide demand for all kinds of goods, ports need to find new ways to meet the increasing volume. Automation has allowed modern ports to move goods more rapidly and safely, and to develop procedures that are designed to make them more resilient in the face of disruptions. Artificial Intelligence offers the opportunity to take the benefits of automation to the next level, to increase the efficiency and capacity of ports even further. While this greatly widens the scope of automation, it raises new challenges and potentially serious risks. The workshop will examine the opportunities for and the potential risks from the adoption of advanced AI for automation in ports. Modern ports have achieved greater efficiency and increased capacity through automation, through integrated and coordinated use of automated vehicles and cranes, drones, smart sensors, robots and robotic devices, more rapid communication and information sharing, and new logistics systems. However, they need to become more efficient, expand their capacity, and at the same time handle a wide variety of challenges such as tsunamis, power outages, accidents, and labor strikes. Traditional automation involves systems programmed for specific tasks without the ability to adapt to unforeseen situations, while AI-powered automation can learn and adapt to new information, and so it performs a much wider variety of tasks and makes decisions in new and increasingly complex environments, without human intervention. However, there are risks to interfacing AI with automation, including potential for new kinds of disruptions, lack of experience in dealing with them, and the potential for machines creating damage if given increased autonomy to make decisions. The workshop will explore such questions as: What is different about automation in the age of AI? What are some obstacles involved in implementation of AI-powered automation? What are some of the key optimization questions that arise in making ports “smarter”? What are the special risks of increased use of AI in automation in ports and what countermeasures might mitigate impact of new kinds of disruptions? The workshop will bring together academics and practitioners involved with AI and automation of ports and interfacing transportation modes (ships, rail, trucks, barges) and interfacing nearby warehouses, will initiate a dialogue among them, and identify key research questions they can collaborate on in the future. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.