Activities

The following workshops/special sessions/tutorials were organized with the support of the TC on Sustainable Production Automation

• TC member Winifred Ijomah promotes the topics of the TC as editor in chief of Journal of Remanufacturing.
• TC member Andrea Matta promotes the topics of the TC as editor in chief of Services and Manufacturing..

• CEMRA Project. The TC supported a successful CEMRA proposal for 2018, “E-learning course for Sustainable Production Automation”, which received $10,000 from RAS. The project has been formally approved on 07/18/2018 and is under development.

We have four special issues in progress. The detail is given below:

• Special issue on Cybernized, Robust, and Sustainable Manufacturing Systems: Analysis, Design, and Control, guest editors: Jingshan Li, Chrissoleon Papadopoulos, Feng Ju, IISE Transaction, 2018.
• Special issue on Recent Advance of Artificial Intelligence and Automation in Remanufacturing, guest editors: Ying Liu, Gul E. Kremer, Duc Pham, Congbo Li, Robotics and Computer Integrated Manufacturing,2019.
• Special issue on Intelligent Energy Solutions to Sustainable Production and Service Automation, guest editors: Ying (Gina) Tang, Congbo Li, Andrea Matta, and Qing (Cindy) Chang, IEEE Transactions on Automation Science and Engineering, 2019.
• Special Issue on Dynamic/Stochastic Models for Production Planning & Control, guest editors: Stefan Helber, Heinrich Kuhn, Michael Manitz, Andrea Matta, and Raik Stolletz, OR Spectrum, 2019.

In addition, we continue to encourage our TC members to organize workshops and special sessions to SPA-related conferences.

• Special sessions in IEEE International Conference on Automation Science and Engineering: Green Manufacturing, August, 2013, Madison, WI, USA
• Sponsor of planning a Special issue in Robotics and Automation Magazine: Automation in Practice, 2013.
• Sponsor of Special issue of IEEE Transactions on Automation Science and Engineering: Automation in Green Manufacturing, January, 2013
  • Guest editors: Jingshan Li, James Morrison, Mike Tao Zhang, Masaru Nakano, Stephan Biller and Bengt Lennartson
  • 11 papers are accepted
• Sponsor of Special session in IEEE International Conference on Automation Science and Engineering: Green Manufacturing, August, 2012, Seoul, Korea
  • Organizers: Gina Tang and Congbo Li
  • 6 papers were presented and one of which was in the finalist of the best conference paper.
• Sponsor of Special session in IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation: Sustainable Production Automation, May, 2013, Karlsruhe, Germany
  • Proposers: Bengt Lennartson and Jingshan Li
• Co-Sponsor of ASME Manufacturing Science and Engineering Conference: Symposium on Sustainable Manufacturing for Emerging Technologies, June, 2013, Madison, WI
• First committee meeting at IEEE International Conference on Automation Science and Engineering, August 21, 2013, Seoul, Korea

The TC is active in promoting activities not only inside RAS, but also outside RAS to create a bridge with other societies and to enhance the growth of sustainable production automation community. Main activities of the TC are as follows:

• The TC organizes a workshop entitled “Sustainable Production Automation”, which will be held at the 2019 IEEE International Conference on Systems, Man and Cybernetics. The workshop, organized by Ying Tang and Andrea Matta, aims at promoting Sustainable Production Automation across RAS and SMC societies.
• The TC organizes a Special Session entitled “Artificial Intelligence in Sustainable Production Automation”, which will be held at the 2019 IEEE International Conference on Systems, Man and Cybernetics. The special session, organized by Ying Tang and Congbo Li, helped promote Sustainable Production Automation in the SMC community.
• The TC organized a workshop entitled “Smart Energy Solutions to Sustainable Production Service and Automation” (​http://www.smc2018.org/approved-special-sessions/s18-smart-energy-solutions-to-sustainable-production-service-and-automation/​), which will be held at the 2018 IEEE International Conference on Systems, Man and Cybernetics (​http://smc2018.org​). The workshop, organized by Congbo Li, Ying Tang and Lingling Li aims at promoting Sustainable Production Automation across RAS and SMC societies.
• The TC organized a workshop entitled “Operation Optimization and Performance Analysis of Advanced Manufacturing Systems” that was held at the 2018 IEEE International Conference on Networking, Sensing and Control (https://icnsc2018.jnu.edu.cn/Organizing_committees.html), Zhuhai, China, March, 2016. The workshop, organized by JunQiang Wang aims at promoting cross-fertilization between the Sustainable Production Automation community and the Environmental Sensing and Networking community.
• The TC organized a special session on “Design, Modeling and Optimal Control for Resilience and Sustainable Production Systems under Uncertain Disruptions” that was held at IFAC Conference on Manufacturing Modeling, Management & Control (http://mim2016.utt.fr/), Troyes, France, June 28 – June 30, 2016. The special session, organized by Qing Chang, helped promote Sustainable Production Automation in the Automatic Control community.
• The TC organized a special session on “ Agent-based Scheduling” that was held at the 8^th International Congress on Industrial and Applied Mathematics (http://www.iciam2015.cn/), Beijing, China, August 10-14, 2015. The special session organized by JunQiang Wang helped promote Sustainable Production Automation in the Applied Math community.

Typically, at each CASE conference, the TC-SPA holds face-to-face meetings to discuss the latest activities and issues of relevance. Decisions and discussions regarding future directions for the TC-SPA are also discussed. Those events creates social networking opportunities for people involved in Sustainable Production Automation.

• The TC met at Munich during CASE 2018
• The TC met at Xi’an during CASE 2017
• The TC met at Fort Worth during CASE 2016
• The TC met at Gothenburg during CASE 2015

The TC chairs/members keep wining prestigious awards, which are good testimonies for the important work our TC has been delivering.

• The TC founding chair, Prof. Jingshan Li and the TC Co-Chair, Prof. Bengt Lennartson were elected to be IEEE fellows in 2017.
• TC member Professor Weiming Shen won the IEEE Canada Industry Leadership Award for his outstanding contributions to Smart Manufacturing, Smart Home, and Smart Building.
• Best Conference Paper Finalist of 2017 IEEE International Conference on Automation Science and Engineering, August 20-23, 2017, Xi’an, China, “Integration of Process Planning and Cutting Parameter Optimization for Energy-Aware CNC Machining,” by Lingling Li, Congbo Li, Ying Tang, Li Li.
• Best Conference Paper of the 11^th IEEE International Conference on Automation Science and Engineering (CASE 2015), August, Gothenburg, Sweden, “Multi-timescale Optimization between Distributed Wind Generators and Electric Vehicles in Microgrid” by Q. Huang, Q.-S. Jia, L. Xia, and X. Guan.
• Best Conference Paper of the 11^th IEEE International Conference on Automation Science and Engineering (CASE 2015), August, Gothenburg, Sweden, “Plant Flexibility Planning: Problem Formulation and Performance Estimation” by Cong Zhao, Jingshan Li, Ningjian Huang.
• Best student paper award finalist of 11^th IEEE International Conference on Automation Science and Engineering (CASE 2015), August, Gothenburg, Sweden, “Modeling and analysis of e-visits in primary care,” by X. Zhong, J. Li, P.A. Bain and A.J. Musa
• Best student paper award finalist of 2015 IFAC Symposium on Information Control Problems in Manufacturing (INCOM), Ottawa, Canada: Feng Ju, Jingshan Li and John Horst, “Transient Analysis of Bernoulli Serial Line with Perishable Products“
• Best student paper award of 10^th IEEE International Conference on Automation Science and Engineering (CASE 2014), Taipei, Taiwan: Nicla Frigerio and Andrea Matta, ““Energy Saving Policies for a Machine Tool with Warm-Up, Stochastic Arrivals and Buffer Information“