Title: A model for the management of WEEE reverse logistics

Authors: M. Melacini, A. Salgaro, D. Brognoli

Addresses: Department of Management, Economics and Industrial Engineering, Politecnico di Milano, p.zza Leonardo da Vinci 32, 20133 Milano, Italy. ' Department of Management, Economics and Industrial Engineering, Politecnico di Milano, p.zza Leonardo da Vinci 32, 20133 Milano, Italy. ' Avery Dennison Italia, Alfa Business Park, Via Eugenio Luraghi 2/c, 20020 Arese (MI), Italy

Abstract: Product take-back legislations shift responsibility of disposal from consumers to producers. The most known example is for the disposal of the Waste of Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE). Traditional WEEE management approaches focus on a single actor and on specific WEEE categories and do not optimise the system as a whole. This paper presents a linear programming model to manage the assignment of the WEEE flows to consortia of producers, in order to minimise the logistics and administrative costs of the whole system. A case study is used to validate the approach and the potential applications of the model.

Keywords: reverse logistics; linear programming models; WEEE management; WEEE flows; waste of electrical and electronic equipment; market competition; product take-back; product recovery; consortia.

DOI: 10.1504/IJLSM.2010.033888

International Journal of Logistics Systems and Management, 2010 Vol.7 No.1, pp.1 - 18

Published online: 03 Jul 2010 *

Full-text access for editors Full-text access for subscribers Purchase this article Comment on this article