Hot Topics for Sustainability in the IE Research Agenda

1. 62nd Annual IIE Conference and Expo Orlando, FL, May 19-23, 2012 Hot Topics for Sustainability in the IE Research Agenda Eliseo Vilalta-Perdomo University of Lincoln, UK John Corliss PEER Consultants, PC

2. Outline • Aim of this presentation • Sustainability • The genealogy • Dimensions • Complementary or In Conflict • Languages • Potential contributions’ matrix • Industrial Engineering • Current position • Current sources of improvement • Potential unique contributions of IE professionals • Sustainability Division, IIE • Potential contribution • Future steps

3. Aims of this presentation • to identify which part of the IE body of knowledge can contribute most effectively to sustainable development, and • an initial exploration to recognize some “hot topics” that constitute the future of IE research and professional agendas

4. SustainabilityGenealogy Key objectives in relation to peace, security and disarmament; development and poverty eradication; protecting our common environment; human rights, democracy and good governance; protecting the vulnerable; meeting the special needs of Africa, and strengthening the United Nations “a comprehensive plan of action to be taken globally, nationally and locally by organizations of the United Nations System, Governments, and Major Groups in every area in which human impacts on the environment” “sustainable development programmes must seek to enhance the quality of life of peoples, including their health, well-being and safety”. “It has been said that the great question is now at issue, whether man shall henceforth start forwards with accelerated velocity towards illimitable, and hitherto unconceived improvement, or be condemned to a perpetual oscillation between happiness and misery, and after every effort remain still at an immeasurable distance from the wished-for goal”. Different strategies and actions to end poverty and hunger; universal education; gender quality; child health; maternal health; combat HIV/AIDS; environmental sustainability, and global partnership What is (ought to be) the Engineering Research Agenda to Support Sustainable Improvement? What are (ought to be) the contributions from the Industrial Engineering discipline? “to propose long-term environmental strategies for achieving sustainable development by the year 2000 and beyond” Included economic, social and environmental objectives in the sustainable development agenda The Limits to Growth. First environmental best-seller Malthus, 1798, Club of Rome, 1968 Brundtland Report (March, 1987) United Nations Conference on Environment and Development, June 1992 Global Conference on the Sustainable Development of Small Island Developing States, May-June 1994 Programme for the Further Implementation of Agenda 21, June 1997 UN Millennium Declaration, 2000 Millennium Development Goals 2005 IE Research & Professional agendas on sustainability, 2012

5. SustainabilityDimensions PEOPLE Bearable: affordable development that increases quality of life PLANET PROFIT Bearable Equitable Equitable: provides similar opportunities to everybody Sustainable Viable Viable: runs its activities in the long-term (Elkington, 2004)

6. PEOPLE SustainabilityComplementary or In Conflict Property Conflict Development Conflict PLANET PROFIT Resource Conflict

7. Globalization (equitable) SustainabilityLanguages Language ofconsensus Science Shared value SOCIETY (people) • Knowledge • Internal vs. external • Acquisition, codification, recovery & use Quality of Life (bearable) • Capital: • Local vs. global • Standardization • Lost cost ENVIRONMENT (Planet) ECONOMY (Profit) Language of global warming? Language of decision-making Impact (viable) • Efficiency & effectiveness • Lean vs. agile • Low-cost Trade-offs

8. Industrial EngineeringDimensions SOCIAL SCIENCES Quality: process that does well what it is designed to do TECHNICAL SCIENCES ECONOMIC SCIENCES Ergonomics Management Management: process of dealing with or control-ling things or people Industrial Engineering Quality Ergonomics: design to optimize human well-being & overall system performance

9. SustainabilityPotential contributions’ matrix IE perspective? Environmental perspective

10. Industrial engineeringCurrent position • IE professionals have a ‘multidisciplinary’ agenda, as they study the design, improvement, and installation of integrated systems of people, materials, information, equipment, and energy (IIE definition). • Active presence of its professionals in the sustainability facets: • Economic evaluations • Environmental aspects have also been included and coded -e.g. ISO 14000. • Social concerns are considered in current engineering research agenda, -e.g. participatory design.

11. Industrial engineeringCurrent sources for improvement • EFFECTIVENESS. “A dimension of organizational performance involving the ability to choose and achieve appropriate goals”. • EFFICIENCY. “A dimension of organizational performance involving the ability to make the best use of available resources in the process of achieving goals”. • SUSTAINABILITY. To be developed

12. What is sustainability?A look at IIE transactions Under the query of “sustainability” we find… • T.C. Woo (1997) Review of: “Re-engineering for Sustainable Industrial Production”, L.M. Camarinha-Matos (ed.) Chapman & Hall. • John Jackman (1997) Reviewof: “Modeling Techniques for Business Process Re-engineering and Benchmarking”, Guy Doumeingts and Jim Browne (eds) Chapman & Hall. • Kenneth N. McKay & Thomas E. Morton (1997) Reviewof: “Critical Chain”, Eliyahu M. Goldratt The North River Press Publishing Corporation, Great Barrington, MA, 1997. • Ki-Joo Kim & Urmila M. Diwekar (2002) ‘Hammersley stochastic annealing: efficiency improvement for combinatorial optimization under uncertainty’, IIE Transactions,34(9), pp. 761-777 • Irad Ben-Gal, Roni Katz & Yossi Bukchin (2008) ‘Robust eco-design: A new application for air quality engineering’, IIE Transactions, 40(10), pp. 907-918 • Alan G. Hawkes, Lirong Cui & ZhihuaZheng (2011) ‘Modelingthe evolution of system reliability performance under alternative environments’, IIE Transactions, 43(11), pp. 761-772

13. What is sustainability?A look at IIE transactions Ki-Joo Kim & Urmila M. Diwekar (2002) ‘Hammersley stochastic annealing: efficiency improvement for combinatorial optimization under uncertainty’, IIE Transactions,34(9), pp. 761-777 • This paper presents hierarchical improvements to combinatorial stochastic annealing algorithms using a new and efficient sampling technique. The Hammersley Sequence Sampling (HSS) technique is used for updating discrete combinations, reducing the Markov chain length, determining the number of samples automatically, and embedding better confidence intervals of the samples. The improved algorithm, Hammersley stochastic annealing, can significantly improve computational efficiency over traditional stochastic programming methods. This new method can be a useful tool for large-scale combinatorial stochastic programming problems. A real-world case study involving solvent selection under uncertainty illustrates the usefulness of this new algorithm.

14. What is sustainability?A look at IIE transactions IradBen-Gal, Roni Katz & Yossi Bukchin (2008) ‘Robust eco-design: A new application for air quality engineering’, IIE Transactions, 40(10), pp. 907-918 • The method of robust design has long been used for the design of systems that are insensitive to noises. In this paper it is demonstrated how this approach can be used to obtain a robust eco-design (ecological design). In a case study, robust design principles are applied to the design of a factory smokestack, using the Gaussian Plume Model (GPM). The GPM is a well-known model for describing pollutant dispersal from a point source, subject to various atmospheric conditions. In this research, the mean-square-error (MSE) of the accumulated and the maximum pollution values around a given target are defined as the performance measures and used to adjust the design parameters. Both analytical and numerical approaches are used to evaluate the MSE measures over the design space. It is demonstrated how to use the non-linearity in the GPM to reach a low MSE value that produces a cheaper design configuration. The differences between the manufacturer viewpoint and the environmentalist viewpoint with respect to the considered eco-design problem are discussed and analyzed.

15. What is sustainability?A look at IIE transactions Alan G. Hawkes, Lirong Cui & ZhihuaZheng (2011) ‘Modeling the evolution of system reliability performance under alternative environments’, IIE Transactions, 43(11), pp. 761-772 • The dynamics of a system represented by a finite-state Markov process operating under two alternating regimes, for example, day/night, machine working/machine idling, etc., are modeled in this article. The transition rate matrices under the two regimes will usually be different. Also, the set of states of the system that are regarded as satisfactory may depend on the regime in operation: for example, a particular state of the system that may be regarded as satisfactory by day might not be tolerated at night (e.g., the headlights on a car not working). It is assumed that the regime durations are random variables and results are obtained for the availability of such a system and probability distributions for uptimes. Results and numerical examples are also given for two special cases: (i) when the regimes are of fixed duration; and (ii) when the regime durations have negative exponential distributions.

16. What is sustainability?A look at IIE transactions • As the flagship journal of the Institute of Industrial Engineers, IIE Transactions publishes original high-quality papers on a wide range of topics of interest to industrial engineers who want to remain current with the state-of-the-art technologies. The refereed journal aims to foster the engineering community by publishing papers with a strong methodological focus motivated by real problems that impact engineering practice and research. Published monthly, the journal is composed of four focus issues: Design and Manufacturing, Operations Engineering and Analysis, Quality and Reliability Engineering, and Scheduling and Logistics. • IIE Transactions encourages research motivated by critical and complex engineering problems that arise in a wide variety of domains including service, public policy, health care, security, biotechnology, transportation, and others. The journal publishes papers that integrate industrial engineering with other disciplines including statistics, other engineering disciplines, computer science, biological science, and operations research. Articles covering new methodologies and state-of-the-art surveys are included in the journal.   

17. What is sustainability?At 2011 IIE Conference-ISERC

18. What is sustainability?IE professional & researchers • Is it then the economy/environment relation what are we looking at? • Where is the social dimension? • Unique integrated systems perspective?

19. What is sustainability?IE professional & researchers Holland: 35,000kg CO2emissions 550,000 megajoules (>99% fossil) 221 estimated food miles Potential role of the SustainabilityDivision: To become a source for better-informed sustainable decisions: Should we buy roses from Holland or Kenya? $100 million USD annually injected ondeprived Kenyan communities Kenya: 2,200kg CO2 emissions53,000 megajoules (15% fossil)4,237 estimated food miles Is this the right question? Note: According to Williams(2007) for 12,000 roses

20. Potential unique contributions of IE professionals • Policy makers and others are more comfortable in their silos • Industrial Engineers are trained to take a systems view and deal with compound complex systems

21. Potential unique contributions of IE professionals • Icon Consultants • Industry Peers • Accounting Firms • Industry Practitioners • Industry Associates • Regulating Organizations • Architects • Engineering Firms • Vision, Mission, Policies and Strategies • Goals, Priorities, Measures • Operational Procedures and Objectives • Projects to Achieve Objectives • Implement • Most Engineers are uncomfortable at the top of the food chain • Industrial Engineers are Visionary (Bill Wallace, 2010)

22. Some potential tasks for the Sustainability Division: Define the concept of SUSTAINABILITY in the IE context -- What is IIE’s definition of sustainability Identify Hot Topics: IE Tools which, with or without modification, are applicable to Sustainability Fields where IE research and practice can excel Sustainability divisionPotential contribution

23. Sustainability divisionFuture steps • To test different proposition with the rest of our colleagues • Website-based survey? • To participate in the Sustainability Division (SD) • To identify the role and purpose of the SD • To be an active contributor in SD

24. Thank your for your attention • Questions? • Comments?