A cost effectiveness approach for determining the purchasing and operating policies of a combined meteorological data gathering system (Q1061611)

The model we present in this paper was developed to solve a meteorological equipment operations problem involving the purchase and operation of specialized aircraft for the gathering of meteorological data. This aircraft system (termed 'System B') will be used to supplement an existing system using weather balloons (termed 'System A'). The problem involves decision making based upon bi-criterion objectives. These objectives usually occur in the presence of one or both of the following factors: (a) The outputs of the systems have more than one attribute and (b) the outputs may be measured under varying environmental situations. The specific type of problem treated here involves a two objective situation arising from the latter factor. It was found out that due to the nature of this problem it was difficult to implement a utility approach to generate a solution. Therefore, a cost-effectiveness approach is presented to demonstrate a technique for finding the trade-off function between objectives for varying levels of systems and operating characteristics. This approach is similar to that of \textit{R. Subramanian} and \textit{N. Ravichandran} [Z. Oper. Res., Ser. A 24, 83-90 (1980; Zbl 0432.90031)] where a complex two-unit electronic system was studied.