Integration of Production Planning and Scheduling

In Chapter 1, we introduced the supply chain planning matrix and its different planning functions, discussed how scheduling fits within this matrix, and mentioned that integration across functions can lead to better solutions. Chemical production scheduling interacts directly with two functions: (1) production planning, and (2) process automation and control (though the latter are not typically defined as functions of the SC matrix). Integration with automation and control were discussed in Chapter 14. In the present chapter, we discuss the integration of production planning and scheduling. We start, in Section 15.1, with some preliminary concepts and motivation for the need to integrate planning with scheduling. In Section 15.2, we present a formulation for an introductory planning-scheduling problem. We continue, in Section 15.3, with an approach for more complex problems, both in single- and multiunit environments. Finally, in Section 15.4, we overview a general but also algorithmically more advanced approach that is applicable to any production environment. For simplicity, in Sections 15.2 and 15.3, we do not consider special processing features, such as complex storage policies and utility constraints. The method in Section 15.4 can in principle be applied to any facility with any processing feature.