A reliable closed-loop supply chain network design under uncertainty: A case study of a lead-acid battery manufacturer

Nowadays, the concern about strike of disruptions and its consequent huge losses has motivated many researchers to design reliable supply chain networks. As well, inherent uncertainty of input data is a momentous issue which should be considered carefully in the design of supply chain networks due to its adverse effect on quality of strategic, tactical and operational decisions. Therefore, this paper presents a novel model for designing a reliable closed-loop supply chain network in which a new reliability method is introduced. The propounded model not only minimizes the total cost, also efficiently finds a robust network under different kind of disruptions. To cope with imprecision of parameters, an effective possibilistic programming approach is employed. Finally, a real industrial case is used to demonstrate the effectiveness and applicability of the developed fuzzy optimization model.