Use of MCDM techniques in environmentally conscious manufacturing and product recovery: State of the art

Increasing environmental awareness of customers and stricter environmental regulations by local governments force manufacturers to invest in environmentally conscious manufacturing which involves the application of green principles to all phases of a product's life cycle from conceptual design to final delivery to consumers, and ultimately to the end of life (EOL) disposal. They also setup facilities for product recovery which is the recovery of materials and components from returned or EOL products via disassembly, recycling and remanufacturing. To address these new issues efficiently, multi criteria decision making (MCDM) techniques are used in order to evaluate the economic and environmental indicators. This paper presents over 190 MCDM studies in environmentally conscious manufacturing and product recovery (ECMPRO) by classifying them into three major categories. Insights from the review and future research directions conclude the paper.