Question

The three blood banks in Seminole? County, Florida, are coordinated through a central office that facilitates blood delivery to four hospitals in the region. The cost to ship a standard container of blood from each bank to each hospital is shown in the table below. Also given are the biweekly number of containers available at each bank and the biweekly number of containers of blood needed at each hospital.

Destination Hospital2 Hospital3 Hospital 4Supply Hospital1 Source Bank 1 Bank 2 Bank 3 Demand $8 $12 $14 $9 $7 $10 $11 $5 $6 $16 $8 $7 50 80 120 90 70 40 50

The given transportation problem is _____. (Balance/Imbalanced.)

The number of shipments should be made biweekly from each blood bank to each hospital so that total shipment costs are?minimized:

The total cost of the optimal solution? = $_____.

Answer 1

The first step is the formulation of the table in Excel. The given transportation problem is balanced as the total demand for all the hospitals combined is equal to the total supply from all the blood banks combined.

Formulas used

Solver inputs

Final answer

The following is the transportation matrix for shipments that should be made biweekly from each blood bank to each hospital so that total shipment costs are minimized. The total cost of the optimal solution? = $?2020