Normalized projection-based group decision making method and application to marine equipment reliability assessment

Abstract

Scientific assessment of marine equipment reliability is not only crucial to operational safety and environmental safety on board, but also critical for selecting optimum maintenance intervals and making ship Planned Maintenance Schedule (PMS). However, the process of reliability assessment is challenging due to the complex criteria which often contain subjective and imprecise factors. To address this problem, this paper presents a novel normalized projection-based Group Decision-Making (GDM) methodology in which original decision information is collected directly from the experts and without transformations and aggregations to guarantee less information loss. Technique for Order Performance by Similarity to Ideal Situation (TOPSIS) is employed in the new GDM methodology to deal with hybrid decision information, including crisp number, interval number, and intuitionistic fuzzy number. Feasibility and effectiveness of the proposed scheme in this research are illustrated by an application case of marine equipment reliability assessment, and the future research direction is also suggested.