A hybrid Tabu Search approach for the design of a paper recycling network

This paper addresses the design of a paper recycling network including external procurement, in‐house recycling of paper, technology selection and selling or disposing of co‐products. In contrast to the literature, we consider a combined continuous and discrete facility location problem solved by a hybrid Tabu Search approach to enhance candidate facility locations. We provide rules of thumb regarding the length of the tabu list and suggestions regarding runtime boundaries in cases where pre‐evaluations are elaborate. The results based on a real‐life application case show the potential savings of in‐house paper recycling compared to the solely external procurement of recovered paper.