Dublin City University Performance Analysis and Development of Pull-Type Production Control Strategies for Evolutionary Optimisation of Closed-Loop Supply Chains

This project establishes a Closed-Loop Supply Chain (CLSC) design that is analysed through a series of simulation models, aimed at defining the highest performing production control strategy, whilst considering multiple related variables on both the forward and reverse flow of materials in manufacturing environments. Due to its stochastic nature, the reverse logistics side of the CLSC represents an increased source of variance for the inventory management and control strategies as it implies the erratic supply of returned materials, in addition to the very random customer demand, hence with highly variable inputs on both sides of the productive system, intrinsically inherent to this line of research. The dynamic allocation policies, particularly the Dynamic Hybrid Extended Kanban CONWIP special case (DNC HEKC-II), throughout the research space in consideration, evidenced very superior production control performance overall.