Hong C. Zhang

Evaluating obsolete electronic products for disassembly, material recovery and environmental impact through a decision support system

As personal computers and electronic products get obsolete and loose value for the original owner they are being channeled into recycling stream for reuse, remanufacturing and asset recovery. Product take-back programs set up reverse logistics processes for such owners to return equipment they no longer want. In the electronics industry, generally these programs are run by specific manufacturers, but any brand of equipment can be returned. Due to this spurt in end-of-life product recycling programs a new problem has been encountered on the business side. An increasing number of electronic product, characterized by different model, year, brand, type, material etc., are entering recyclers warehouses. To attain sustainable and environmentally sound product recycling these products have to be first disassembled and recycled for material recovery. Recyclers are also required to ensure that hazardous waste is treated separately while recycling. Lack of information on disassembly methods and material information on these products could lead to incoherent decisions. This could affect profit margins as well as lead to inappropriate end-of-life treatment. An information system is therefore needed to aid decision making for adopting best possible end-of-life strategy for electronic products. Proposed system provides easy access to recyclers on different electronic models about optimal disassembly sequence, cost and time, gives information on hazardous and precious element contents, and composition of different components. This paper presents the results of such a system developed at Texas Tech University and tested at a recycling facility. This system further allows environmental impact assessment of the electronic products based on their material inventory using eco-indicator 99 scores. These scores can be of significance in determining products or components which have the highest environment impact and should be given special attention while recycling. A personal computer, laptop, printer, server and a flat panel monitor were analyzed for this study. System architecture, product information and system results are presented in this paper.

Design for environment: an environmental analysis model for the modular design of products

Due to the internal and external pressure, more and more manufacturing enterprises are working to improve the environmental performance of their products. Pollution may be generated at all stages through the whole life cycle of a product. Taking potential environmental impacts of a product into account as early as at its design stage, design for environment (DFE) can be used to maximally improve the environmental performance of a product. Modular design is a widely used design method for electromechanical products. While traditional modularity analysis pays little attention to the environmental factors, this research aims at including the environmental criteria into the modularity analysis, and developing a DFE design supporting system for the modular design. This paper proposed a quantitative environmental analysis methodology for the modular design. Considering all stages through the life cycle of a product, some primary environmental objectives are analyzed and selected as the criteria for the modularity analysis; all environmental criteria are ranked using the fuzzy analytic hierarchy process (FAHP). In order to get a comprehensive effect of all environmental criteria, fuzzy numbers are used to combine some uncertain judgments of decision makers with crisp numbers. In this paper, the modularity analysis is done under the restriction of the junction-structure mapping, and it includes the similarity and independence analysis.

An exploration of simultaneous engineering for manufacturing enterprises

With the increasing application of high technology in manufacturing enterprises, the traditional serial or sequential production approach has begun to be replaced by a parallel or simultaneous production approach. The functional balance of organisations of current manufacturing enterprises is decline. The organisation within manufacturing enterprises needs to be restructured and the functions need to be adjusted. Many production functions within an enterprise can be integrated by following the production information. This is the premise of this exploration of simultaneous engineering in manufacturing enterprises. A functional model of an enterprise is described in this paper. Some possibilities of functional integration within an enterprise are discussed. Finally, some related research activities are outlined to stimulate an open discussion on the point of view.

Automated tolerance analysis for CAPP system

Various computer-aided process planning (CAPP) systems can produce different process plans, but few of them can deal with the specified design tolerances that have a significant influence on the process selection, machine selection, set-up and datum selection, operation sequencing, cutting condition decisions, and time and cost calculations; nor can they provide exact information on fixture/datum and the coordinates of the tool movements that are the necessary data for automated NC programming. The focus of this paper is on the discussion of an automated tolerance based analysis approach of CAPP systems.

Comparison of AHP and reference point method in the environmental decision support model

This paper presents what the environmental decision making problem is and methodologies to solve this problem. Advantages and disadvantages of analytic hierarchy process (AHP) and the reference point method when they are used in the environmental decision support model are discussed thoroughly.

A framework for environmental impact assessment tools: comparison validation and application using case study of electronic products

There is growing international pressure on original equipment manufacturers of electronic products to reduce the environmental impact of their products. Hence a conscious effort is being made by them to evaluate the environmental impact of their products and thus identify aspects leading to the environmental burden. This paper presents a recent research aimed to develop an environmental impact evaluation framework for electronic products based on existing environmental assessment (EIA) software systems. A comprehensive evaluation and comparison of select software systems is presented using relevant case studies of standard computer products. The paper also evaluates a framework for extending the environmental evaluation to the end-of-life scenario of these products.

An economic model for end-of-life management of printed circuit boards

The end-of-life (EOL) management of electronic products is of great concern not only to governmental agencies but also to OEMs with legislations coming into place. This paper describes the activities involved in the EOL management of printed circuit boards and its recycling process. The various activities are classified into activity centers and the economic model is built upon. The proposed economic model is divided into cost and energy models respectively. The purpose of this model is to apportion costs to the outputs obtained after recycling accurately and also give a clear picture of the energy consumption utilized by the recycling process. This model can aid PCB recycling companies in their process optimization and their EOL strategies by providing accurate picture of cost and energy consumptions.

Plug and play information sharing architecture and its application in green supply chain management

Current consciousness in environment protection requires manufactures to green their supply chain. To do this, more business units and more complicated information and material flows will be involved. Another parameter is related to environment information, which is most important to green the supply chain. This brings new requirements and function to the information systems. In this paper we presented a new architecture for information sharing. Its application in green supply chain management (GSCM) is discussed. A special software entity called PMM (product material management) which was developed in a previous project based on this strategy is also introduced.

Recycling plastics from electronic scrap: A case study

This paper discusses a project undertaken as an exploratory research work to find physico-mechanical properties of the finished product developed from the innovative plastics recycling process. For the purpose of this research PC/ABS plastics from electronic scrap such as computer chassis and printer ink cartridges were reclaimed and tested for material properties.