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S. M. MOODY, Advanced Processes and Packaging, Natick Soldier Center, Kansas Street, Natick, MA 01760 High data capacity active Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) tags have been used in the Department of Defense for almost a decade for in-transit asset visibility of air pallets and inter-modal freight containers. The inception of passive RFID provides a low-cost extension of asset visibility to the item, case, and pallet level. In July 2004, the Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology, and Logistics published the DOD RFID Policy. This policy provides detailed guidance on active tagging, business rules for passive RFID implementation, and a supplier implementation plan that describes a targeted roadmap. Since 2000, the Combat Feeding Directorate has been at the forefront of passive RFID development, and one of the first DOD organizations to conduct operational test and evaluation of passive RFID for the military supply chain. In February 2004, the Combat Feeding Directorate conducted a technology demonstration at Defense Depot San Joaquin that successfully demonstrated the use of passive RFID to track military rations in an end-to-end supply chain. This “vendor-to-foxhole” demonstration also used semi-passive, sensor equipped RFID tags to capture the ambient temperature during storage and distribution. The temperatures were then used in a computer shelf life model to calculate the remaining shelf life of the rations. This technology has shown great potential for supply chain management, and is currently being explored for use in food security applications. Well-established partnerships with academia, industry, and other government agencies continue to facilitate the advancement of innovative and revolutionary technologies.
Session 15, The dawn of RFID: What have we learned and where we are going?
2005 IFT Annual Meeting, July 15-20 - New Orleans, Louisiana |