Low-frequency collection of materials disassembled from end-of-life vehicles: On the value of on-line monitoring in optimizing route planning

New European legislation for end-of-life vehicles has led to national car-recycling systems such as Auto Recycling Nederland. Increasingly, these reverse supply chains are under cost pressures but regulation remains firm. Typically, these systems are supply driven and notoriously uncertain due to a lack of information. In this article, we present an approach to optimize the collection (transportation) of dismantled materials from end-of-life vehicles. Experience from forward supply chain management has shown the potential of joint coordination of e.g. transportation and inventory decisions. Using new (mandatory installed) information technology, we are now able to monitor inventory levels of dismantled materials on distance. We introduce a proactive ‘look ahead’ planning methodology based on two types of collection orders: MUST and CAN orders. Every review period all MUST orders have to be collected, while CAN orders are only collected if they can be combined beneficially with MUST orders. The routing problems are solved by a combination of route generation and set partitioning.