Benchmarking Sustainable Manufacturing: A DEA-Based Method and Application

Jun- Der Leu, Wen-Hsien Tsai, Mei-Niang Fan and Sophia Chuang
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Jun- Der Leu: Department of Business Administration, National Central University, Taoyuan City 32001, Taiwan
Wen-Hsien Tsai: Department of Business Administration, National Central University, Taoyuan City 32001, Taiwan
Mei-Niang Fan: Department of Business Administration, National Central University, Taoyuan City 32001, Taiwan
Sophia Chuang: Department of Business Administration, National Central University, Taoyuan City 32001, Taiwan

Energies, 2020, vol. 13, issue 22, 1-21

Abstract: In past decades, many manufacturing enterprises have followed the business model of productivity maximization, in which achieving maximum profit using limited resources is the business goal. Although this industrial strategy may make profit, it can be detrimental to the long-term social welfare. Industrial regulations require that enterprise should be responsible for the natural environment and the health of their employees while achieving their business goals. This presents a complex problem involving the trade-off between ecology and economy so that an efficient strategic decision support method is needed. Since the value-added process of a manufacturing company encompasses both desirable and undesirable outputs, in this study we use a data envelopment analysis-based model to measure performance sustainability. In it, energy, water, and manpower are considered as input resources, meanwhile CO 2 emissions, wasted water, chemical compounds, and laborers’ injuries are considered as bad outputs. The proposed approach is applied to a global chemical manufacturing company to benchmark the sustainability of its production sites located in Asia. Based on the benchmarking results, the theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

Keywords: sustainable manufacturing; data envelopment analysis (DEA); bad-output model (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q Q0 Q4 Q40 Q41 Q42 Q43 Q47 Q48 Q49 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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