IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jeners/v14y2021i8p2204-d536724.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

A General Framework for Multi-Criteria Based Feasibility Studies for Solar Energy Projects: Application to a Real-World Solar Farm

Author

Listed:
  • Sree Harsha Bandaru

    (School of Energy and Electronic Engineering, University of Portsmouth, Portsmouth PO1 3DJ, UK)

  • Victor Becerra

    (School of Energy and Electronic Engineering, University of Portsmouth, Portsmouth PO1 3DJ, UK)

  • Sourav Khanna

    (School of Energy and Electronic Engineering, University of Portsmouth, Portsmouth PO1 3DJ, UK)

  • Harold Espargilliere

    (School of Energy and Electronic Engineering, University of Portsmouth, Portsmouth PO1 3DJ, UK)

  • Law Torres Sevilla

    (School of Mechanical and Design Engineering, University of Portsmouth, Portsmouth PO1 3DJ, UK)

  • Jovana Radulovic

    (School of Mechanical and Design Engineering, University of Portsmouth, Portsmouth PO1 3DJ, UK)

  • David Hutchinson

    (Faculty of Technology, University of Portsmouth, Portsmouth PO1 3AH, UK)

  • Rinat Khusainov

    (School of Computing, University of Portsmouth, Portsmouth PO1 3DJ, UK)

Abstract

The growth of solar energy is projected to slow down during 2023–25 despite the fall in costs due to economic deceleration, reduced incentives, and market barriers including the lack of relevant and flexible energy project planning and decision-making tools. This study proposes a flexible and computationally simple multi-criteria decision analysis (MCDA)-based model that takes technical, financial, environmental, social and legal aspects of all project options as input and outputs a feasibility score for each option, which enables ranking the options and identifying the best alternative. The proposed model is applied to a real-world photovoltaic solar farm planned at a site in England and comprising nine different configurations formed by varying system capacity, energy storage option, mode of stakeholder, and network connections. The results of our study show that in this case the options without battery storage and a greater number of off-taker connections are more favorable than the options with battery storage. The analysis also shows that for the solar farm of the presented case study, ‘self-consumption fraction’ and ‘energy yield’, ‘net present value’, ‘life-cycle carbon emission reduction’, ‘ease of permit acquisition’ and ‘public approval’ are key sub-criteria for ‘technical’, ‘financial’, ‘environmental’, and ‘social and legal’ criteria, respectively. A sensitivity analysis was conducted to assess the confidence on the obtained solution, and a change in the first preference was noticed when ‘environmental’ and ‘social and legal’ aspects are given higher weight over ‘technical’ and ‘financial’ aspects. The results obtained are in line with the recommendations by experts, who carried out an independent feasibility analysis considering the same options.

Suggested Citation

  • Sree Harsha Bandaru & Victor Becerra & Sourav Khanna & Harold Espargilliere & Law Torres Sevilla & Jovana Radulovic & David Hutchinson & Rinat Khusainov, 2021. "A General Framework for Multi-Criteria Based Feasibility Studies for Solar Energy Projects: Application to a Real-World Solar Farm," Energies, MDPI, vol. 14(8), pages 1-34, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jeners:v:14:y:2021:i:8:p:2204-:d:536724
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/14/8/2204/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/14/8/2204/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Edalati, Saeed & Ameri, Mehran & Iranmanesh, Masoud & Tarmahi, Hakimeh & Gholampour, Maysam, 2016. "Technical and economic assessments of grid-connected photovoltaic power plants: Iran case study," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 114(C), pages 923-934.
    2. Strantzali, Eleni & Aravossis, Konstantinos, 2016. "Decision making in renewable energy investments: A review," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 55(C), pages 885-898.
    3. Cavallaro, Fausto, 2009. "Multi-criteria decision aid to assess concentrated solar thermal technologies," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 34(7), pages 1678-1685.
    4. Wang, Jiang-Jiang & Jing, You-Yin & Zhang, Chun-Fa & Zhao, Jun-Hong, 2009. "Review on multi-criteria decision analysis aid in sustainable energy decision-making," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 13(9), pages 2263-2278, December.
    5. Baumann, Manuel & Weil, Marcel & Peters, Jens F. & Chibeles-Martins, Nelson & Moniz, Antonio B., 2019. "A review of multi-criteria decision making approaches for evaluating energy storage systems for grid applications," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 107(C), pages 516-534.
    6. Ricardo G. Barcelona, 2015. "Renewable Energy with Volatile Prices: Why NPV Fails to Tell the Whole Story," Journal of Applied Corporate Finance, Morgan Stanley, vol. 27(1), pages 101-109, March.
    7. M. A. Parvez Mahmud & Nazmul Huda & Shahjadi Hisan Farjana & Candace Lang, 2018. "Environmental Impacts of Solar-Photovoltaic and Solar-Thermal Systems with Life-Cycle Assessment," Energies, MDPI, vol. 11(9), pages 1-21, September.
    8. Piotr Olczak & Małgorzata Olek & Dominika Matuszewska & Artur Dyczko & Tomasz Mania, 2021. "Monofacial and Bifacial Micro PV Installation as Element of Energy Transition—The Case of Poland," Energies, MDPI, vol. 14(2), pages 1-22, January.
    9. Afgan, Nain H. & Carvalho, Maria G., 2008. "Sustainability assessment of a hybrid energy system," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 36(8), pages 2893-2900, August.
    10. Charabi, Yassine & Gastli, Adel, 2011. "PV site suitability analysis using GIS-based spatial fuzzy multi-criteria evaluation," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 36(9), pages 2554-2561.
    11. Begić, Fajik & Afgan, Naim H., 2007. "Sustainability assessment tool for the decision making in selection of energy system—Bosnian case," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 32(10), pages 1979-1985.
    12. Haoran Zhao & Sen Guo & Huiru Zhao, 2018. "Comprehensive Performance Assessment on Various Battery Energy Storage Systems," Energies, MDPI, vol. 11(10), pages 1-26, October.
    13. Cavallaro, Fausto, 2010. "Fuzzy TOPSIS approach for assessing thermal-energy storage in concentrated solar power (CSP) systems," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 87(2), pages 496-503, February.
    14. Kumar, Abhishek & Sah, Bikash & Singh, Arvind R. & Deng, Yan & He, Xiangning & Kumar, Praveen & Bansal, R.C., 2017. "A review of multi criteria decision making (MCDM) towards sustainable renewable energy development," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 69(C), pages 596-609.
    15. Sánchez-Lozano, Juan M. & Teruel-Solano, Jerónimo & Soto-Elvira, Pedro L. & Socorro García-Cascales, M., 2013. "Geographical Information Systems (GIS) and Multi-Criteria Decision Making (MCDM) methods for the evaluation of solar farms locations: Case study in south-eastern Spain," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 24(C), pages 544-556.
    16. Horia Andrei & Cristian Andrei Badea & Paul Andrei & Filippo Spertino, 2020. "Energetic-Environmental-Economic Feasibility and Impact Assessment of Grid-Connected Photovoltaic System in Wastewater Treatment Plant: Case Study," Energies, MDPI, vol. 14(1), pages 1-22, December.
    17. Indre Siksnelyte & Edmundas Kazimieras Zavadskas & Dalia Streimikiene & Deepak Sharma, 2018. "An Overview of Multi-Criteria Decision-Making Methods in Dealing with Sustainable Energy Development Issues," Energies, MDPI, vol. 11(10), pages 1-21, October.
    18. McManus, M.C., 2012. "Environmental consequences of the use of batteries in low carbon systems: The impact of battery production," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 93(C), pages 288-295.
    19. Karakaya, Emrah & Sriwannawit, Pranpreya, 2015. "Barriers to the adoption of photovoltaic systems: The state of the art," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 49(C), pages 60-66.
    20. Tsoutsos, Theocharis & Frantzeskaki, Niki & Gekas, Vassilis, 2005. "Environmental impacts from the solar energy technologies," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 33(3), pages 289-296, February.
    21. Jovanović, Marina & Afgan, Naim & Radovanović, Predrag & Stevanović, Vladimir, 2009. "Sustainable development of the Belgrade energy system," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 34(5), pages 532-539.
    22. Stein, Eric W., 2013. "A comprehensive multi-criteria model to rank electric energy production technologies," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 22(C), pages 640-654.
    23. Afgan, Naim H. & Carvalho, Maria G., 2002. "Multi-criteria assessment of new and renewable energy power plants," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 27(8), pages 739-755.
    24. Rezaei, Jafar, 2015. "Best-worst multi-criteria decision-making method," Omega, Elsevier, vol. 53(C), pages 49-57.
    25. Aragonés-Beltrán, P. & Chaparro-González, F. & Pastor-Ferrando, J.P. & Rodríguez-Pozo, F., 2010. "An ANP-based approach for the selection of photovoltaic solar power plant investment projects," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 14(1), pages 249-264, January.
    26. Mardani, Abbas & Zavadskas, Edmundas Kazimieras & Khalifah, Zainab & Zakuan, Norhayati & Jusoh, Ahmad & Nor, Khalil Md & Khoshnoudi, Masoumeh, 2017. "A review of multi-criteria decision-making applications to solve energy management problems: Two decades from 1995 to 2015," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 71(C), pages 216-256.
    27. Clews, Robert, 2016. "Project Finance for the International Petroleum Industry," Elsevier Monographs, Elsevier, edition 1, number 9780128001585.
    28. Mi, Xiaomei & Tang, Ming & Liao, Huchang & Shen, Wenjing & Lev, Benjamin, 2019. "The state-of-the-art survey on integrations and applications of the best worst method in decision making: Why, what, what for and what's next?," Omega, Elsevier, vol. 87(C), pages 205-225.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Abdellah Menou & Risto Lahdelma & Pekka Salminen, 2022. "Multicriteria Decision Aiding for Planning Renewable Power Production at Moroccan Airports," Energies, MDPI, vol. 15(14), pages 1-20, July.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Indre Siksnelyte & Edmundas Kazimieras Zavadskas & Dalia Streimikiene & Deepak Sharma, 2018. "An Overview of Multi-Criteria Decision-Making Methods in Dealing with Sustainable Energy Development Issues," Energies, MDPI, vol. 11(10), pages 1-21, October.
    2. Maghsoud Amiri & Mohammad Hashemi-Tabatabaei & Mohammad Ghahremanloo & Mehdi Keshavarz-Ghorabaee & Edmundas Kazimieras Zavadskas & Arturas Kaklauskas, 2021. "Evaluating Life Cycle of Buildings Using an Integrated Approach Based on Quantitative-Qualitative and Simplified Best-Worst Methods (QQM-SBWM)," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(8), pages 1-28, April.
    3. Paula Donaduzzi Rigo & Graciele Rediske & Carmen Brum Rosa & Natália Gava Gastaldo & Leandro Michels & Alvaro Luiz Neuenfeldt Júnior & Julio Cezar Mairesse Siluk, 2020. "Renewable Energy Problems: Exploring the Methods to Support the Decision-Making Process," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(23), pages 1-27, December.
    4. Klein, Sharon J.W. & Whalley, Stephanie, 2015. "Comparing the sustainability of U.S. electricity options through multi-criteria decision analysis," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 79(C), pages 127-149.
    5. Mainali, Brijesh & Silveira, Semida, 2015. "Using a sustainability index to assess energy technologies for rural electrification," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 41(C), pages 1351-1365.
    6. Khishtandar, Soheila & Zandieh, Mostafa & Dorri, Behrouz, 2017. "A multi criteria decision making framework for sustainability assessment of bioenergy production technologies with hesitant fuzzy linguistic term sets: The case of Iran," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 77(C), pages 1130-1145.
    7. Sellak, Hamza & Ouhbi, Brahim & Frikh, Bouchra & Palomares, Iván, 2017. "Towards next-generation energy planning decision-making: An expert-based framework for intelligent decision support," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 80(C), pages 1544-1577.
    8. Madjid Tavana & Akram Shaabani & Francisco Javier Santos-Arteaga & Iman Raeesi Vanani, 2020. "A Review of Uncertain Decision-Making Methods in Energy Management Using Text Mining and Data Analytics," Energies, MDPI, vol. 13(15), pages 1-23, August.
    9. Yilan, Gülşah & Kadirgan, M.A. Neşet & Çiftçioğlu, Gökçen A., 2020. "Analysis of electricity generation options for sustainable energy decision making: The case of Turkey," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 146(C), pages 519-529.
    10. Simsek, Yeliz & Watts, David & Escobar, Rodrigo, 2018. "Sustainability evaluation of Concentrated Solar Power (CSP) projects under Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) by using Multi Criteria Decision Method (MCDM)," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 93(C), pages 421-438.
    11. Ifaei, Pouya & Tayerani Charmchi, Amir Saman & Loy-Benitez, Jorge & Yang, Rebecca Jing & Yoo, ChangKyoo, 2022. "A data-driven analytical roadmap to a sustainable 2030 in South Korea based on optimal renewable microgrids," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 167(C).
    12. José Carlos Romero & Pedro Linares, 2021. "Multiple Criteria Decision-Making as an Operational Conceptualization of Energy Sustainability," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(21), pages 1-14, October.
    13. Mardani, Abbas & Zavadskas, Edmundas Kazimieras & Khalifah, Zainab & Zakuan, Norhayati & Jusoh, Ahmad & Nor, Khalil Md & Khoshnoudi, Masoumeh, 2017. "A review of multi-criteria decision-making applications to solve energy management problems: Two decades from 1995 to 2015," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 71(C), pages 216-256.
    14. Colla, Martin & Ioannou, Anastasia & Falcone, Gioia, 2020. "Critical review of competitiveness indicators for energy projects," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 125(C).
    15. Silvia Angilella & Maria Rosaria Pappalardo, 2022. "Performance assessment of energy companies employing Hierarchy Stochastic Multi-Attribute Acceptability Analysis," Operational Research, Springer, vol. 22(1), pages 299-370, March.
    16. Zografidou, Eleni & Petridis, Konstantinos & Petridis, Nikolaos E. & Arabatzis, Garyfallos, 2017. "A financial approach to renewable energy production in Greece using goal programming," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 108(C), pages 37-51.
    17. Firozjaei, Mohammad Karimi & Nematollahi, Omid & Mijani, Naeim & Shorabeh, Saman Nadizadeh & Firozjaei, Hamzeh Karimi & Toomanian, Ara, 2019. "An integrated GIS-based Ordered Weighted Averaging analysis for solar energy evaluation in Iran: Current conditions and future planning," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 136(C), pages 1130-1146.
    18. Riley, David & Schaafsma, Marije & Marin-Moreno, Héctor & Minshull, Tim A., 2020. "A social, environmental and economic evaluation protocol for potential gas hydrate exploitation projects," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 263(C).
    19. Bortoluzzi, Mirian & Correia de Souza, Celso & Furlan, Marcelo, 2021. "Bibliometric analysis of renewable energy types using key performance indicators and multicriteria decision models," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 143(C).
    20. Sitorus, Fernando & Brito-Parada, Pablo R., 2020. "A multiple criteria decision making method to weight the sustainability criteria of renewable energy technologies under uncertainty," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 127(C).

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jeners:v:14:y:2021:i:8:p:2204-:d:536724. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.