Saving Connecticut One Mattress at a Time: a Real-Life Case Study at to Improve Mattress Recycling Process at Park City Green

UB School of Engineering has partnered with the PCG to increase their operational efficiency in addition to finding alternative markets for their raw materials. Possible expansion plans are also discussed and included in addition to other improvement opportunities. This study introduces the motivation behind the study while reporting on the findings of this collaborative research

Design and Evaluation of a Logistics Network for Tire Recovery in Turkey

Tire remanufacturing, commonly known as tire retreading, and tire recycling are very profitable, yet many companies who reprocess used tires mostly conduct either only recycling or only retreading in Turkey. In this study, the profitability of adding a tire retreading facility into the logistics network for a company in Turkey who currently conducts recycling operations only is investigated. The problem is formulated and solved as a mixed integer programming (MIP) model to find the optimal design that maximizes the overall profit. Numerical experimentations are conducted to see the effects of changing return parameters on the optimal design and profit

A Supplier Selection Model for End-of-Life Product Recovery: An Industry 4.0 Perspective

In order to sustain their long-term competitiveness, organizations are under constant pressure to strategically realign their businesses towards globalization and digitalization to adopt to changes in market dynamics. This requires two major structural challenges to be addressed: How can manufacturers and consumers become active participants of environmentally responsible product disposal activities, How fast and efficiently manufacturers can respond to changing market and capital needs while preserving their environmental, economic, and social sustainability levels. Industry 4.0 rises as a viable solution due to its ability to overcome these challenges and effectively respond to the increasing demand for mass customization. This concept is signified as a fully digitized future production and logistics system where all primary objects within a factory such as human, machine, and product as well as all partners within a supply chain such as supplier, manufacturer, logistics provider, and consumer are linked to one another

Evaluation of Waste Electronic Product Trade-in Strategies in Predictive Twin Disassembly Systems in the Era of Blockchain

Manufacturing and supply chain operations are on the cusp of an era with the emergence of groundbreaking technologies. Among these, the digital twin technology is characterized as a paradigm shift in managing production and supply networks since it facilitates a high degree of surveillance and a communication platform between humans, machines, and parts. Digital twins can play a critical role in facilitating faster decision making in product trade-ins by nearly eliminating the uncertainty in the conditions of returned end-of-life products. This paper demonstrates the potential effects of digital twins in trade-in policymaking through a simulated product-recovery system through blockchain technology. A discrete event simulation model is developed from the manufacturer’s viewpoint to obtain a data-driven trade-in pricing policy in a fully transparent platform. The model maps and mimics the behavior of the product-recovery activities based on predictive indicators. Following this, Taguchi’s Orthogonal Array design is implemented as a design-of-experiment study to test the system’s behavior under varying experimental conditions. A logistics regression model is applied to the simulated data to acquire optimal trade-in acquisition prices for returned end-of-life products based on the insights gained from the system.https://doi.org/10.3390/su1213541