Location and Capacity Optimization of Waste Recycling Centers: Mathematical Models and Numerical Experiments

Shenming Xie, Ying Terk Lim, Huiwen Wang, Wen Yi, Maxwell Fordjour Antwi-Afari

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

With rapid urbanization growth, considerable amounts of construction waste are generated on an annual basis, posing significant economic and environmental challenges worldwide. Re-cycling construction waste is a sustainable way for waste disposal, leading to the necessity of meticulous planning of recycling centers. A well-designed plan for constructing recycling centers can effectively improve the recycling rate of construction waste while minimizing investment. This paper formulates a two-stage stochastic model for planning recycling centers with the objective of maximizing the recycling rate under different scenarios. This study comprehensively considers various uncertain factors, such as the amount of construction waste generated and the demand for recycled materials. A case study of Guangzhou is used for validation, which demonstrates the effectiveness of the developed model in planning recycling center construction. The comparison between the proposed model and a conventional mean value model shows the importance of accounting for uncertainties. Specifically, the derived results indicate that 7% more construction waste is recycled with the same investment in constructing recycling centers. Additionally, via a sensitivity analysis, valuable managerial insights on investing resources in recycling center construction are provided to decision makers. Ultimately, the research findings are expected to enhance the recycling rate of construction waste, thereby contributing to sustainable industry development.
Original languageEnglish
Article number7039
Number of pages20
JournalApplied Sciences
Volume14
Issue number16
Early online date11 Aug 2024
DOIs
Publication statusE-pub ahead of print - 11 Aug 2024

Bibliographical note

© 2024 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https:// creativecommons.org/licenses/by/ 4.0/).

Data Access Statement

The raw data supporting the conclusions of this article will be made available by the authors on request.

Keywords

  • constuction waste
  • recycling centers
  • stochastic optimization
  • uncertainty

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