A Control Engineering Approach to the Ripple Effect Analysis in Closed-Loop Supply Chains

Closed-loop supply chains, incorporating circular economic principles, play a key role in enhancing the sustainability of production systems and creating economic opportunities for firms. In today's business environment, characterized by frequent disruptions, these systems need to be both efficient and resilient to remain competitive. However, integrating efficiency and resilience is not a straightforward task. This manuscript discusses control engineering as a promising approach to understand closed-loop supply chain resilience. It enables the analysis of the propagation of disruptions (the ripple effect), thus aiding managerial decision-making. We use an example to demonstrate the potential of control theory in improving the resilience of closed-loop supply chains.