An integer programming model for prescribing material recovery strategies

A disposed product is comprised of several parts, each of which may have some material value or reuse. The goal of a disassembly operation is to retrieve these valuable parts and then forward them to the appropriate recycling streams. From a disassembly perspective the problem then is to determine which parts to retrieve from the product, and then which bin to dispose the retrieved part to. Often parts are retrieved as subassemblies and disposed as a whole. This problem is combinatorial in nature and is amenable to mathematical modeling, since a variety of disposable options are possible. In this paper we present the Optimal Part Disposal (OPD) model for solving the above problem. The OPD is formulated as a mixed integer program and maximizes the net profit from the disposal action. The OPD can be incorporated in a DFE tool to improve the recycling yield of new products.