Product take-back and remanufacturing systems are difficult to implement cost-effectively. Two contributing factors to this problem are the complex nature of the interrelationships among components, and their high degree of variability. Legislated take-back mandates have made it imperative for manufacturers to realize when there is value to be recovered in components and when there is not. This paper proposes a component criticality method to help ascertain this remaining value. We also develop a metric that measures the randomness or variability that a reuse alternative imposes on the remanufacturing system. A case study on washing machines illustrates how the two measures can be incorporated into a design decision model, can help reduce the complexity of reuse operations, and result in a superior design solution.
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