The objective of this PhD is to design and model the recycling value chain as a true System of Systems (SoS), explicitly addressing the complexity arising from the multiplicity and diversity of stakeholders, their interactions at various levels (local, regional, national), and their potentially divergent goals. The developed architecture will aim to enhance the agility, flexibility, and overall resilience of the network while ensuring its robustness and long-term viability in the face of regulatory, economic, and technological changes.
Coherently with the objective, the following scientific contributions are expected.
The first scientific contribution will focus on designing a multi-level architecture that enables the coherent integration of local initiatives such as industrial symbiosis (micro level) with regional and national recycling strategies (meso and macro levels). The modelling approach will rely on the foundational principles of Systems of Systems engineering, including the explicit definition of actors' capabilities in order to clearly structure their roles, responsibilities, and interactions within the ecosystem.
The second contribution is the formalization of generic and adaptable modelling patterns to represent dynamic interactions between actors, product flows, and regeneration processes. These patterns will facilitate reuse, generalization, and adaptation of the models to different industrial contexts, thereby reducing the time required to design or reconfigure the network.
Moreover, given the fast evolution of technologies, regulatory frameworks, market conditions, and the possible emergence of new recycling actors, a structural adaptability and dynamic reconfiguration mechanisms must be incorporated. These capabilities are essential to ensure the architecture remains responsive and does not become rigid or obsolete. An agent-based modelling approach is then particularly suited to capture such dynamics and can be adopted for implementation and validation.
Particular attention will also be paid to the articulation between the different decision-making levels (strategic, tactical, operational) and the modelling of multi-actor decision processes. This approach will enable a better understanding of the complexity of governance and management mechanisms within recycling value chains, while supporting the precise definition of required data, its update frequency, and its aggregation level.