Heuristic algorithm for RCPSP with the objective of minimizing activities' cost

Resource-constrained project scheduling problem(RCPSP) is an important problem in research on project management. But there has been little attention paid to the objective of minimizing activities' cost with the resource constraints that is a critical sub-problem in partner selection of construction supply chain management because the capacities of the renewable resources supplied by the partners will effect on the project scheduling. Its mathematic model is presented firstly, and analysis on the characteristic of the problem shows that the objective function is non-regular and the problem is NP-complete following which the basic idea for solution is clarified. Based on a definition of preposing activity cost matrix, a heuristic algorithm is brought forward. Analyses on the complexity of the heuristics and the result of numerical studies show that the heuristic algorithm is feasible and relatively effective.