Article ID: | iaor20011779 |
Country: | Netherlands |
Volume: | 126 |
Issue: | 1 |
Start Page Number: | 131 |
End Page Number: | 151 |
Publication Date: | Oct 2000 |
Journal: | European Journal of Operational Research |
Authors: | Hoogeveen J.A., Raaymakers W.H.M. |
Keywords: | optimization: simulated annealing |
Scheduling problems in multipurpose batch process industries are very hard to solve because of the job shop like processing structure in combination with rigid technical constraints, such as no-wait restrictions. This paper shows that scheduling problems in this type of industry may be characterized as multiprocessor no-wait job shop problems with overlapping operations. A simulated annealing algorithm is proposed that obtains near-optimal solutions with respect to makespan. This paper shows that the no-wait restrictions require several adaptations of the neighborhood structure used by simulated annealing. The performance of the algorithm is evaluated by scheduling industrial instances from a multipurpose batch plant in the pharmaceutical industry. Our results indicate that simulated annealing consistently gives better results for a number of realistic instances than simple heuristics within acceptable computation time.