Research Article Selecting the Optimal LoA to Prevent the Expansion of COVID-19 in the Chemical Industry considering Sustainability Factors: A Fuzzy Mathematical Optimization Approach Mahtab Hajghasem , 1 Amir-Reza Abtahi , 2 Kaveh Khalili-Damghani , 1 and Reza Yousefi-Zenouz 2 1 Department of Industrial Engineering, Islamic Azad University, South Tehran Branch, Tehran, Iran 2 Department of Operations Management and Information Technology, Kharazmi University, Tehran, Iran Correspondence should be addressed to Amir-Reza Abtahi; abtahi@khu.ac.ir Received 4 June 2022; Revised 21 July 2022; Accepted 28 July 2022; Published 10 September 2022 Academic Editor: Reza Lotfi Copyright © 2022 Mahtab Hajghasem et al. is is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Automation has attracted interest from the industry sector for its potential to improve energy efficiency, cost efficiency, and environmental performance. By elevating the LoA to the highest degree, associated costs will grow accordingly and its implementation will be far more complicated. is will also result in losing workers and decreasing environmental pollutants. On the other hand, increasing power consumption at high levels of automation leads to the production of greenhouse gases. is paper aims to increase the level of automation (LoA) considering the concept of sustainability. is study presents fuzzy multi- objective programming to determine the optimal LoA considering sustainability factors to achieve competitive advantages. To solve the model, the Zimmermann max-min approach was adopted and a cosmetics factory in Iran was chosen to optimize LoA according to this model. e results showed that it is possible to improve the LoA and also consider sustainability factors with the available resources without using the highest LoA. is study can help managers optimize the LoA in their organizations considering the current resources and sustainability issues, and control the company’s return on investment and cost of overhead. ey can run the model with every definition of LoA proposed till now. is research can benefit the environment and the workers’ health in the production line by reducing environmental pollutants and prevent the dismissal of all personnel due to its negative social effects. It also reduces the risk of COVID-19 by minimizing the number of workers. So far, a mathematical model for selecting optimal LoA in the chemical industry considering sustainability has not been presented. 1. Introduction e high competition among producers and a variety of products has caused organizations to optimize LoA which entails benefits like an increase in quality as well as the production speed, more accurate and faster quality control (QC), a reduction in production waste, better interaction with business systems, an increase in the productivity of industrial units, an increase in the safety factor for manpower and the reduction of mental and physical stress among workers [1]. e implementation of high LoA is a very important issue due to the decrease in dangerous gases emitted from chemical interactions and the transportation hazards of chemicals that threaten the workers in the chemical industry [2]. However, implementing automation at high levels en- tails heavy expenditure which most organizations cannot afford. Moreover, performing the jobs manually prolongs the production process that in turn increases the chance of infiltration of microbes into the product and can damage the environment and the consumers; therefore, chemical in- dustries can reduce these hazards and the production time by increasing the LoA [3]. Although, at high levels of au- tomation, the number of workers reduces which causes social concerns in the chemical industry. Due to the Hindawi Discrete Dynamics in Nature and Society Volume 2022, Article ID 5836663, 19 pages https://doi.org/10.1155/2022/5836663