Evaluating efficiencies of turbofan jet engines: A data envelopment analysis approach

Data envelopment analysis (DEA), a mathematical-programming-based method, has been developed in the operations research and economics literatures for effecting efficiency evaluations. Its use is explained and illustrated with an application to data on turbofan jet engines. Results are compared with standard engineering methods for measuring efficiency. In contrast to the latter, DEA handles data on multiple inputs and multiple outputs that can be used to characterize the performance of each engine. This is accomplished without recourse to any use of prearranged weights. DEA also provides information on the sources and amounts of inefficiencies in each input and output of each engine without requiring knowledge of the functional relations that give rise to these estimates. DEA represents an alternative method for evaluating efficiencies. Its purpose is to augment, not replace, traditional methods.