Operational and environmental performance measures in a multi-product closed-loop supply chain

This paper investigates a number of operational and environmental performance measures, in particular those related to transportation operations, within a closed-loop supply chain. A mathematical model in the form of a linear programming formulation is used to model the problem, which captures the trade-offs between various costs, including those of emissions and of transporting commodities within the chain. Computational results are presented for a number of scenarios, using a realistic network instance.

Research highlights
► Costs of transportation operations outweigh their emission costs in a supply chain.
► Reusable products reduce operational transport costs, but increase emission costs.
► Increasing capacity of low-emission transportation modes reduces emission costs.