Article
Sustainability Performance Evaluation of Faceshield Bracket
Manufacturing by Using the Analytic Hierarchy Process
Getasew Taddese
1,
*, Severine Durieux
2
and Emmanuel Duc
2
Citation: Taddese, G.; Durieux, S.;
Duc, E. Sustainability Performance
Evaluation of Faceshield Bracket
Manufacturing by Using the Analytic
Hierarchy Process. Sustainability 2021,
13, 13883. https://doi.org/10.3390/
su132413883
Academic Editors: João Carlos de
Oliveira Matias and Paolo Renna
Received: 30 October 2021
Accepted: 9 December 2021
Published: 15 December 2021
Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral
with regard to jurisdictional claims in
published maps and institutional affil-
iations.
Copyright: © 2021 by the authors.
Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.
This article is an open access article
distributed under the terms and
conditions of the Creative Commons
Attribution (CC BY) license (https://
creativecommons.org/licenses/by/
4.0/).
1
Addis Ababa Institute of Technology, School of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering,
Addis Ababa University, Addis Ababa P.O. Box 385, Ethiopia
2
Clermont Auvergne INP, CNRS, Institut Pascal, Université Clermont Auvergne,
63000 Clermont-Ferrand, France; severine.durieux@sigma-clermont.fr (S.D.);
emmanuel.duc@sigma-clermont.fr (E.D.)
* Correspondence: getasew.taddese@aau.edu.et; Tel.: +251-9-1263-8000
Abstract:
Faceshield brackets were among highly relevant products manufactured in various work-
shops, including Sigma Clermont, during the outbreak of COVID-19 to tackle acute shortages of
personal protective equipment. However, many of these products are yet to be checked for appropri-
ateness in design, quality, safety, comfort, and overall sustainability performance which might lead
to unknown damages to human health and the environment. Thus, the main objective of this study
is to evaluate the sustainable performance of Faceshield bracket manufacturing. Appropriate data
are collected from designers, machine operators, and supplementary data are utilized from experts’
opinions and literature. A total of 38 carefully selected indicator sets are utilized while applying
multicriteria decision-making methodology (MCDM) of the analytic hierarchy process (AHP) to
evaluate the sustainability performance of these manufacturing processes. Evaluation is performed to
examine the processes’ sustainability performance and associated indicator contribution based on the
three dimensions. Results disclosed that 3D printing (score = 0.108) showed better performance for
the environment, and injection molding showed better economic and social performance, with scores
of 0.1922 and 0.160, respectively. A detailed contribution of each subcriteria for each sustainability
dimension and each of the three processes as well as major contributing indicators are identified and
discussed. Finally, overall performance was assessed using the total sum approach, and Borda count
methodology and injection molding showed better sustainability performance in the manufacturing
of Faceshield brackets considered with scores of 43 and 87, respectively. The authors believe that
indicator selection approaches and overall methodology followed for this study will be relevant for
future sustainability evaluation of engineering products.
Keywords:
sustainability; sustainability assessment; sustainable manufacturing; multicriteria deci-
sion making; analytic hierarchy process
1. Introduction
The whole world, especially healthcare workers, faced a shortage of sufficient PPE and
healthcare facilities during the unprecedented outbreak of coronavirus (COVID-19) which
was a big challenge for all countries in the world. During this period, several 3D printing
industrialists including Ford Motor company worked to manufacture 3D printed Personal
Protective Equipment (PPE) [
1
]. As part of a solidarity effort of the CHU de Clermont-
Ferrand, a university hospital center in Clermont-Ferrand, France, in its effort of preventing
transmission of COVID-19 outbreak, Sigma Clermont successfully manufactured three
different Faceshield brackets by using injection molding, 3D printing, and laser cutting,
as shown in Figure 1. Enhancing such efforts helped to make an immediate delivery at
least to local hospitals to tackle shortages of PPE. Such dispersed efforts of producing PPE
in different workshops require proper knowledge of design procedure, consideration of
mandatory features and preconditions for the intended purpose not to compromise the
Sustainability 2021, 13, 13883. https://doi.org/10.3390/su132413883 https://www.mdpi.com/journal/sustainability
