A holistic approach for decision on selection of end-of-life products recovery options

Decision on end-of-life product recovery options is affected by many factors; they are factors related to engineering, business, environmental, and societal factors. These factors come from wide spectrum of stakeholders' interests. Perspectives vary from one stakeholder to another; hence, some of these factors are conflicting. For example, product designers' interest in composite light weight material may conflict with recycler's interest in pure and easy-to-recycle material. A method that identifies all stakeholders who are directly involved or indirectly affected by such decision would be beneficial to the selection of right product recovery option. This paper provides a method that guides the process of decision making on end-of-life product recovery option. The method is different from previous ones in its inclusion of all stakeholders who has interest in the process. The proposed method gives decision maker flexibility to accommodate for different cases (Case specific situations). It is enough comprehensive to be general and enough flexible to be specific, this would make the decision taken using this method accurate by selecting appropriate recovery options, and informative by presenting the most influential factors that lead to the decision. Previous methods found in literature are reviewed and been inconsideration when developing the proposed method. Knowledge obtained from industrial best practices and well documented case studies also included. Product designers and business decision makers would benefit from this work on deciding about the fate of their product as a whole or its constituents. The implementation of the developed method is demonstrated through an industrial product; the method robustness is tested by assessing its sensitivity to extreme situations. In conclusion, the decision on end-of-life product recovery option is governed by different stakeholders. A method that considers the collective interests of all stakeholders is apparently needed; such method is developed in this paper and is validated using industrial example. (C) 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.