A system dynamics model in closed-loop supply chain by assessing sustainability

Abstract

Since the 20th century, the global economic system has been developing rapidly. At the same time, discretional exploitation of natural resources caused some major problems such as global ecological damage, resources wastage and shortage and environmental pollution. On the other hand, remanufacturing of used merchandise and bringing them back to the market provides not only the environmental and customer benefits to Original Equipment Manufactures (OEMs) but it also cuts back their production cost. In sum, there is now a well-recognized need for achieving overall sustainability in industrial activities arising due to several established and emerging causes: diminishing non-renewable resources, stricter regulations related to environment and occupational safety/health, increasing consumer preference for environmentally-friendly products. Owing to the revolution in sustainable and green manufacturing the production planning and network design of Closed Loop Supply Chain (CLSC) concept has caught the attention of researchers and managers. The goal of this project is to provide an extensive and detailed review of investigations related to applying System Dynamics (SD) in the sustainability of closed loop supply chain. The final result proved that it can be achieved to sustainability by SD method in CLSC. This project considered customer satisfaction and Green Image factor (GIF) as factors which encompass two dimensions of sustainability to make a sustainable CLSC in manufacturing. In this project, a CLSC system is simulated by focusing on two main factors, which are customer satisfaction and green image factor to help the company to have corrective and preventive action to comply with ISO 9001 and ISO 14001. The impacts of shipment time and delivery time on the demand backlog level and customer satisfaction degree are examined first, and then the effects of collector centre is investigated to improve the GIF level by increasing the amount of return used products.