SGER: Production Planning Models for Companies with Remanufacturing Capability

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9520438 Uzsoy This research is aimed at addressing the problem of remanufacturing of a product at the end of its life cycle. It is a research that is aimed at integrating issues on preserving environmental quality and at same time maintain economic manufacturing. In particular, the research will pursue the development of a model of a production system with remanufacturing capability which can be used to explore the effects of different demand patterns, production and disposal costs, and government actions on the economic viability of remanufacturing policies. Remanufacturing involves the refurbishing and/or partially rebuilding a product returned from the market at the end of its life to give it the functionality of a new product. This research is exploratory in nature. The basic components of the model to be developed will include product staging, disassembly, sorting, cleaning, repair, and assembly. With respect to assembly operations, manual assembly is assumed. The model also assumes that both remanufacturing and new assemblies are carried out simultaneously in the same facility. When fully developed, the model will be used to determine a minimum cost procurement and production plan. Output from the model will include (1) the quantity of a product to disassemble, (2) the quantity of each component to reuse or dispose of, (3) the quantity of each product to remanufacture, and (4) the quantity of new components and products of each type to make in order to satisfy market demand. The problem of environmental degradation resulting from improper disposal of products that have reached the end of their life cycles is increasingly being recognized in many parts of the world. Whereas the proposed research will not eliminate the problem, it does, however, lessen the impact by developing a methodology to integrate the reuse of old components into manufacturing. The impact on environment, resource usage and conservation, and manufacturing cost savings to be derived from the research can be q uite significant. The models to be developed will pave the way for the realization of complete models that can be used by companies to evaluate the costs and benefits associated with integrating environmental concerns into manufacturing decisions and processes.