An integrated expert system/operations research approach for the optimization of waste incinerator siting problems

This research aims at developing an integrated decision support system for the optimization of waste incinerator siting problems. In this integrated approach, both expert system and operations research techniques are used to model the siting problems of waste incinerator. Furthermore, an expert decision support system (EDSS) is implemented for the above problem and thus providing the decision makers a useful tool for decision-making. This EDSS is based on multi-criteria decision analysis in finding the best incinerator site by minimizing costs and environmental impacts. The proposed approach identifies a hierarchy of objectives for the siting problem. First of all, several potential sites need to be screened as a set of feasible alternative sites. Second, those alternative feasible sites will be further evaluated via the multi-criteria decision making methods. For the evaluation process, we solve a 0/1 combinatorial optimization problem at the upper level and proceed the multi-attribute utility function at the lower level to get the optimal solutions. An empirical application of a real world waste incinerator site selection existing in Taichung City, Taiwan is followed in the end. Computational results both of the cost minimization and of the whole systems are also provided.