Solving the energy-aware flexible job shop problem using a memetic algorithm

This article addresses the flexible job shop problem with interval processing times. Minimising makespan is a well-known scheduling objective that is widely used in many sectors; however, energy efficiency is gaining more importance as climate change intensifies. In this work, we minimise the makespan and the total energy consumption using a lexicographic goal programming approach. A memetic algorithm that is composed of a genetic algorithm and a local search method is developed and tested to solve this problem. The results show that our approach manages to improve the best-known results.