ARABIAN JOURNAL FOR SCIENCE AND ENGINEERING, vol.43, no.6, pp.3269-3278, 2018 (SCI-Expanded)
Hazardous material forms are generally identified as solids, liquids or gases which can potentially harm the environment and surrounding organisms. Decisions regarding hazardous material management are of vital importance for environmental sustainability. Therefore, the placement and location of hazardous material warehouses should have some well-defined criteria such as distances from adjacent properties, motorways and railways, and infrastructure such as utilities in order not to harm the environment and living beings. Meanwhile, since transportation costs are an important factor for companies, the selected location should minimize the transportation costs from the warehouse to distribution points. The purpose of this study is to determine the most suitable location for an explosive and ammunition warehouse to be established in the Marmara Region of Turkey, with an aim to minimize the transportation costs from the point of origin (warehouse) to the distribution point and simultaneously minimize or eliminate impact to the environment and living beings. A hybrid methodology of a mathematical model, the analytical hierarchy process (AHP) and geographical information systems (GIS) is proposed for the solution of this problem. First, the weights of nine identified criteria are determined by using AHP, then these weights are used in GIS, where alternative locations are identified, and finally, the optimal explosives and ammunition warehouse location which minimizes transportation costs are chosen among the alternatives, by setting a P-Median model.