Over the last ten years, global economic developments have had an increasing influence on supply and demand trend in the dry bulk market. This increase has impacted on the shipping, dry cargo handling, bulk terminal operations and transportation industries. As a result the capacity of bulk handling terminals had to be increased, where on the other hand discussions about environmental regulations and pollution increase. The objective of this paper is to point out several issues to be solved in the near future. It results in an overview and analysis of differences and similarities of the facilities for the handling, storage, and processing of the bulk material. The analysis will be used to set up research projects at the department of Marine and Transport Technology of Delft University of Technology to further investigate the chances and challenges on improving equipment for the storage and transportation of particulate solids as well as their logistics.