Production planning and control for remanufacturing: A state-of-the-art practices and challenges

Other conference contribution, 2025

Abstract :

Remanufacturing has been advocated as a sustainable manufacturing approach that captures value from end-of-life products. However, remanufacturing deals with used products, which are uncertain in quality, quantity, and timing of returns, making production planning and control (PP&C) for remanufacturing complicated. Research highlights a gap in empirical knowledge regarding PP&C for remanufacturing, with only a few studies providing empirical data on how remanufacturers plan and control production. 
 
Design/methodology/approach:
The paper uses a survey methodology and builds upon ​Guide’s (2000)​ work in the US. The aim is to collect empirical data and document practices and challenges of PP&C in remanufacturing. Aspects of PP&C for remanufacturing investigated include product returns management, materials management, production scheduling, capacity planning, and the use of digital technologies. 

Findings:
Data collection ongoing and the preliminary results show that remanufacturers source most of their products from partnerships and often have no information about their quality beforehand. To balance product returns with demand, several strategies and policies are reported. However, most remanufacturers do not use emerging digital technologies. 

Practical implications:
The paper provides empirical evidence documenting current practices and challenges of PP&C in remanufacturing, thus, the results of the paper may be of interest to remanufacturers seeking to benchmark PP&C practices.