Multi-criteria Evaluation Method Research Articles

Identification, Characterization and Mapping of Potential Irrigable Areas in Ziway Micro Watershed

Irrigation land suitability assessment and mapping for irrigation purpose is important to utilize the land resources efficiently. This study was initiated to assess, evaluate and develop map of the land resources which is potentially suitable for surface irrigation in ziway micro watershed by using Geographic Information System (GIS). The evaluation of land in terms of the suitability classes was based FAO guideline for land evaluation. Multi-criteria decision evaluation method and suitability factors were used such as, soil data, slope, land use/cover for evaluate the physical land characteristics of the study area of surface irrigation and suitability map was developed. After evaluating the physical land capability for surface irrigation, irrigation suitability map was developed. The weighted overlay analysis gave 70.1 and 13.3% of the study area is lies in the range of very high suitable to marginally suitable for irrigation. Thus, the overall suitability shows that potentially irrigable land suitable for surface irrigation is about 83.4% of the area. Therefore, based on results, farmers, decision makers, investors, planners and policymakers at the local, regional and national levels and the government should invest in those suitable areas for irrigation.

ОСОБЛИВОСТІ КЛАСИФІКАЦІЇ ТА МЕТОДІВ ВИБОРУ БПЛА

Unmanned aerialvehicles (UAVs) are being actively adopted in various areas of human activity, demonstrating excellent results. Their usage allows to minimize the risks of people being in high-risk conditions, and integration with various systems expands the range of functions that previously seemed impossible.There are currently over 1,500 different official UAV designs, and the number is growing rapidly. The effectiveness of choosing a specific model and its subsequent application for the specific tasks requires a clear classification. Domestic classification is mainly inherent in the military sphere and in the sphere of civil protection with a limited extent, which creates uncertainty for other possible spheres of application. Other classifications do not have sufficient completeness and do not consider an integrated approach to modern requirements and technical characteristics of UAVs.Currently there is no single science-based systematic approach to the design of UAVs based on the use of optimization methods. It is clear that the problem of this kind is multi-criteria, and cannot do without optimization mathematical models and methods. However, the dynamics of the development of elements and solutions, the growth of information objects regarding new models and characteristics, the consideration of interrelated factors make this process impossible without decision support systems. The use of parametric synthesis allows to determine the compromise between stability and workability of systems.Criteria analyze for classification and modern methods for selecting unmanned aerial vehicles.The usage of electronic software tools, so-called electronic drone calculators, can help to solve the problem of choosing the optimal UAV design.Most of the classifications today are oriented to the needs of the military. The main criterion for choosing a scheme depends on the list of expected functions and tasks, flight range and altitude, as well as requirements for cargo capacity and possible on-board equipment. The approach of the mathematical method of multi-criteria evaluation, such as the method of analyzing hierarchies, is optimal.The article is an overview and information.

Development of a Method of Multi-Criteria Evaluation under Uncertainty

Development of a Method of Multi-Criteria Evaluation under Uncertainty

Competitiveness of the Selected Countries of the EU with a Focus on the Quality of the Business Environment

The business environment and entrepreneurship are important elements in the economic growth of each country. The better the business environment a given country offers, the more attractive the country is for small and large companies as well as for private entrepreneurs. A high level of business competitiveness can help a country secure economic growth, especially after overcoming a crisis such as the COVID-19 pandemic. Many institutions focus on the measurement of the business environment using indices to evaluate its quality. The main goal of the present study is to evaluate the quality of the business environment through multicriteria analysis. For the period from 2018 to 2020, the data were analysed by using seven selected indices of the weighted sum approach (WSA) and the technique for order preference by similarity to ideal solution (TOPSIS) methods. The research sample included all EU countries that joined the EU at the same time in 2004. The processing of analytical data was gradually implemented by using descriptive statistics and multicriteria evaluation methods. The methods used in the multicriteria evaluation of variants determined the rankings of the individual variants in terms of the selected criteria using entropy. We concluded that the efficiency of the business environments in Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Poland, Latvia, Lithuania, Slovakia and Slovenia are below the EU average. Within this group of countries, Estonia, Malta and Slovenia have seen the largest regeneration of their business environment since having joined the EU.

Assessment of airside aerodrome infrastructure by SAW method with weights from Shannon's interval entropy

Multi-criteria decision support (MCDM) methods are widely used in many areas of science. This applies to economic, social and technical sciences. Implementing activities at the strategic, tactical or operational level requires appropriate tools to support decision-makers. The use of these tools requires the preparation of a decision model along with the formalization of the goal and the acquisition and preparation of data to make the decision accurate. Due to the wide application of MCDM in engineering practice, the article presents their application in air transport. It is an area that is constantly evolving, and all decisions at the strategic level have long-term effects and must be adequately justified. In the paper a compartmental extension of the classical SAW method with weights obtained using the compartmental Shannon entropy was proposed. This paper presents issues concerning the choice of airport layout and describes the problems that occur in determining the cost and capacity of airports. This paper reviews the literature on airport capacity and operations and airside air transport processes and the application of various multi-criteria decision support methods to airport problems. The main part of the article contains an optimization mathematical model aimed at determining the parameters of the elements comprising the airport, on the basis of which a simulation model was developed and a modified method of multi-criteria evaluation of SAW taking into account the interval numbers was presented, in which the set of weights was estimated by the Shannon entropy method. In the application part for 3 variants of the airport arrangement, the parameters were determined in the form of interval numbers and then evaluated using the presented method. The presented numerical example shows that the proposed method is an excellent tool to assist in solving complex decision problems where the data are imprecise and represented by interval numbers.

Multi-Criteria Performance Evaluation System in the Industrial Heritage Reuse Plan

Industrial heritage is unique in terms of its patterns, reuse characteristics, economic relevance and social operations. Under the government’s “Industrial Heritage Regeneration Project”, a menu of outcome/performance assessments have been in practice and have evolved. This paper combines expert methods, the Analytic Hierarchy Process, and the Multi-criteria Evaluation Method, along with qualitative and quantitative data, to clarify the hierarchical structure and weight of factors that influence outcome/performances. The research purpose is to establish an integrated multi-criteria performance evaluation model for the reuse of industrial heritage. The findings identify a long list of factors by crossing the four major factors concerning the reuse of industrial heritage, namely regeneration creativity, operational management, implementation effectiveness and sustainable developments. Regeneration creativity is considered as the most important element, and the presentation of thematic plans and characteristics is the most important influencing factor. It is suggested that clarifications should be made concerning the factors that affect different facets in the execution of reuse initiatives. The research findings can serve as a reference for decision-making in reuse and development by reflecting the culture and value for the reuse and implementations of industrial heritage.

Ranking based on optimal points and win-loss-draw multi-criteria decision-making with application to supplier evaluation problem

Supplier evaluation is a complex multi-criteria decision-making (MCDM) problem that deals with assessment of suppliers as the potential alternatives against various types of criteria. We consider the context where decision makers (DMs) have complete information about the suppliers and criteria. To address the needs of decision makers, a multi-criteria evaluation method named Ranking based on optimal points (RBOP) is developed in this paper. By imitating and simulating human decision-making behavioural patterns, the developed MCDM method selects the best alternative that is closer to what the DM desires. Furthermore, a novel subjective MCDM weighting methods called win-loss-draw (WLD) method is also developed, which is also based on human behavioural pattern. A real case study of domestic cheese brands is considered to apply the developed methods to select the best cheese supplier for an Iranian hypermarket. Compared to other MCDM methods, outputs of the RBOP method show some differences due to the impact of WLD method, which intensified divergence and optimal points during the decision-making process.

Performance of Multicriteria Evaluation and Heuristic Methods in the Delineation of Green Infrastructure in Areas with Fragmented Landscapes

The EU Commission has established Green infrastructure as one of the tools to preserve biodiversity and grant the provision of ecosystem services that reduce impacts on natural values like those produced by climate change. Therefore, a European green infrastructure strategy has been created that commit member states to incorporate green infrastructure to their territorial planning. Yet, methodologies to delimit green infrastructure so as to facilitate its inclusion in territorial plans are still scarce. The available methods are mainly based in multicriteria evaluation and focus on zoning general green infrastructure areas taking into account the provision potential of just a few ecosystem services. Considering the provision of a wide range of ecosystem services to delimit green infrastructure elements is key to grant their multifunctionality and increase their efficiency mitigating climate change impacts in natural values and human population. However, the lack of data or the high cost to accurately map ecosystem services provision potential, leads most of the time to infer it from land cover data. This creates problems when using these maps to delimit green infrastructure in areas with fragmented landscapes; since identified green infrastructure areas may be irregular and scattered. There are heuristic methods like simulated annealing that have been used to identify ecosystem services hot spots which consider the regularity and size of the identified patches. These methods can be used to delimit green infrastructure in fragmented landscapes finding a balance between the regularity of the areas and their potential to provide multiple ecosystem services. In the current work, a comparison has been made between the performance of simulated annealing and current multicriteria evaluation methods to delimit green infrastructure multifunctional buffer zones in an area of north-western Spain with a very fragmented landscape. Results have shown that simulated annealing delimits more regular multifunctional buffer areas but with a less average potential for providing multiple ecosystem services. The conclusions of the paper indicate that simulated annealing is good produces more regular multifunctional areas but with a lower ESs provision potential. It was observed that in the case of ESs that were mapped considering factors at landscape scale, their provision potential did not vary too much between the multifunctional buffer areas delimited with each of the methods. This indicates that delineation methods may produce more regular GI elements if ESs provision potential is mapped considering the influence of biophysical factors at a wider landscape scale.

Fuzzy GIS-based MCDM solution for the optimal offshore wind site selection: The Gulf of Maine case

This paper describes a multi-criterion decision-making approach for optimal off-shore wind location assessment by including fuzzy geographical information systems to prioritize the different locations and alternatives. The multi-objective framework involves a variety of elements, such as climatic, geographic, social, environmental, location, and economic factors. The proposed decision-making solution is based on a multicriteria evaluation method divided into two steps: an analytic hierarchy process and a prioritization of the alternatives in comparison to a parallel approach based on a fuzzy geographical information system solution. The Gulf of Maine (USA) is considered as a case example, owing to the relevant offshore wind potential of such an area. A descriptive statistical evaluation of the wind resource was previously carried out to characterize this area with wind speed field measurements for 10 years (2010–2019). A design proposal for a 1 GW offshore wind power plant is used in a case study based on a 15 MW variable speed wind turbine prototype recently proposed by the IEA Wind Task 37. The results include prioritization of optimal offshore wind power plant sites, levelized cost of electricity estimation, and avoided emissions in comparison to traditional supply side scenarios, mainly based on fossil fuel generation units.

Evaluation and Intercomparison of Topographic Correction Methods Based on Landsat Images and Simulated Data

Topographic effects in medium and high spatial resolution remote sensing images greatly limit the application of quantitative parameter retrieval and analysis in mountainous areas. Many topographic correction methods have been proposed to reduce such effects. Comparative analyses on topographic correction algorithms have been carried out, some of which drew different or even contradictory conclusions. Performances of these algorithms over different terrain and surface cover conditions remain largely unknown. In this paper, we intercompared ten widely used topographic correction algorithms by adopting multi-criteria evaluation methods using Landsat images under various terrain and surface cover conditions as well as images simulated by a 3D radiative transfer model. Based on comprehensive analysis, we found that the Teillet regression-based models had the overall best performance in terms of topographic effects’ reduction and overcorrection; however, correction bias may be introduced by Teillet regression models when surface reflectance in the uncorrected images do not follow a normal distribution. We recommend including more simulated images for a more in-depth evaluation. We also recommend that the pros and cons of topographic correction methods reported in this paper should be carefully considered for surface parameters retrieval and applications in mountain regions.

Sustainable juice evaporation unit selection for noncentrifugal sugar production by multicriteria evaluation methods

AbstractIn the conventional practice of producing noncentrifugal sugar (NCS), many technologies are available for juice evaporation, all of which may not be sustainable. The sustainability of these units is dependent on multiple criteria belonging to resources, technical, economic, process‐output, and environmental parameters. This paper presents the work undertaken to identify the most sustainable juice evaporation unit (to produce NCS) among 10 alternatives using three multicriteria evaluation (MCE) techniques, namely TOPSIS, PROMETHEE II, and VIKOR. The analyses were based on 11 evaluation criteria covering four sustainability elements. Analytic hierarchy process (AHP) and entropy weight approaches were used to assess the importance of each criterion for the ranking of evaporation units. The necessary data were obtained from three different decision‐maker groups, namely academics and sustainability promoters, NCS manufacturers, and NCS plant suppliers. The resulting criteria weights indicate that capital cost (with AHP analysis based weights as 16.81, 12.51, 15.30% for decision‐makers groups I, II, III, and a weight of 23.28% from entropy method) is found to be the most crucial criterion. With assessment values of 0.741, 0.186, and 0.048 in TOPSIS, PROMETHEE II, and VIKOR, respectively, “single pan with the improved furnace” emerged to be the most sustainable option. This result is also substantiated by a group priority index of 1.08 obtained through the geometric mean method of analysis. This suggests that “single pan with the improved furnace” is the most sustainable one for NCS production. Furthermore, sensitivity analyses undertaken indicate that “single pan with the improved furnace” is most and least sensitive to “greenhouse emissions” and “process time,” respectively. With these outcomes, this paper demonstrates that the methodology adopted herein could be considered for assessing the sustainability of other process units involved in NCS production.Practical ApplicationsIn the conventional practice of producing NCS, there are various technologies available for the evaporation of juice. This paper narrates the MCE‐based work to identify a sustainable juice evaporation unit. It can be suggested that the most sustainable unit is “single pan with improved furnace” and the least sustainable is “multi‐effect evaporator.” The results of the present analysis suggested that the use of the other nine units for the production of NCS is to be subjected to thorough scrutiny, specifically regarding their sustainability. The methodology taken up for this analysis could be extended for other subprocesses in the NCS production process line to get the most sustainable process line.

Humans in the upstream can exacerbate climate change impacts on water birds\u2019 habitat in the downstream

The present paper aims to quantify how human-made changes in the upstream exacerbate climate change impacts on water birds’ habitat in the downstream. To reduce climate change effects and design adaptation policies, it is important to identify whether human activities understate or overstate the effects of climate change in a region on its inhabitants. This paper also shows how human activities may magnify climate change impacts both locally and regionally. Land-use/land-cover change as the important sign of human-made destruction in an ecosystem was detected in the upstream of the Helmand basin over 40 years. Owing to conflicts in Afghanistan, studies on this basin are rare. The water bird’s habitat suitability maps during the study period were created using the maximum entropy model and the multi-criteria evaluation method. The post-classification method was applied to show the land-use/land-cover change over 40 years. These results were compared to the area of suitable habitat for water birds. The findings of these analyses indicated that the irrigated farming was expanded in the upstream despite climate change and water limitation, while the water birds’ habitat in the downstream was declined. These results revealed that the unsustainable pattern of farming and blocking water behind dams in the upstream exacerbated the negative effects of climate change on water birds’ habitat in the downstream. The significance of this study is to demonstrate the role of human in exacerbating climate change impacts both locally and regionally.

Strategic Environmental Assessment in the Application of Preventive Protection for Wind Farm Noise—Case Study: Maestrale Ring Wind Farm

Determining the spatial position of wind turbines is the initial and most important phase in the development of a wind farm project. In this sensitive phase, all potential problems that may arise in the later stages of project development should be prevented by means of spatial and urban planning instruments. This makes it possible to achieve maximum use of the potential of wind in a particular space and, thus, fulfil the technical and economic requirements of the project while respecting the goals of environmental protection in that same area, through preventive protection. Therefore, it is essential, even at the earliest planning and development stage of a wind farm project, for the requirements that are important for optimal spatial solutions to be balanced. In this process, strategic environmental assessment (SEA) is a support to the planning process and an invaluable instrument for finding optimal spatial solutions for the possible key spatial impacts of wind power with regard to noise, shadow flicker, ornithofauna and chiropterofauna. The weakness of SEA can be seen in its predominant application of expert qualitative methods that bring with them subjectivity, since they depend on expert knowledge and skills. This paper presents the aspect of noise impact assessment and its inclusion in the SEA for the Maestrale Ring wind farm in Serbia. The results of the research indicate how it is possible to achieve the principle of objectivity in the process of multicriteria expert evaluation by including the results of a partial impact assessment of the noise from wind farms, using results obtained from software modeling of the spatial dispersion of wind turbine noise in the SoundPlan 8.1 software package in the SEA process. These quantitative results predicting the noise level were used in a semi-quantitative method of multicriteria evaluation in the SEA through the definition of criteria to determine the ranking of impacts, which is elaborated in the paper. The results also show the significant of the contribution of applying a methodological approach based on a combination of qualitative and quantitative evaluation methods in SEA. These methods positively affect the application of the principle of preventive protection through the optimal selection of the number and position of wind turbines on one hand and the objectivity of drawing conclusions based on which strategic decisions are made in the final phase of the SEA process, on the other.

Wind farms selection using geospatial technologies and energy generation capacity in Gwadar

Pakistan has been a victim of energy crisis since last few decades. This energy crisis has adversely affected country’s socio-economic development and continues to do so. The continuously increasing demand–supply gap has negatively impacted the economic stability of the country. With the recent awareness and development of alternate energy resources like wind and solar, the current energy crisis can be minimized. However, proper planning is essential for successful execution of these renewable energy projects. This study aims to identify the suitable sites for wind farms in District Gwadar, Balochistan using Geographical Information Systems (GIS) and Web-based Spatial Decision Support System (SDSS). In this study, multi-criteria decision making is applied which assists breaking down the site selection complexity. Multi-Criteria evaluation methods provides different set of procedures that facilitate decision making by analyzing different alternatives. The underlying geospatial and ICT technologies used in this analysis form the core component of the planning process. Gwadar is currently drawing investor’s attention due to its geographical location, deep seaport, and proposed China–Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC). This research is useful for stakeholders of Wind Energy to explore the wind potentials using GIS as an interactive decision-making tool during the pre-feasibility stage.Furthermore, this research has considered the environmental, social and economic aspects during the decision-making process of wind farm development. This is the strength of multi-criteria evaluation as differently weighted scenarios provide different output, depending on the factors considered of highest importance. A detailed analysis of the sites in terms of their wind potential and energy generation capacity has also been reported in this study. This long coastline of Balochistan with huge wind energy potential has not been explored yet and therefore this study will assist researchers to further explore this area and can have a positive impact on CPEC.

Economic optimization of microgrids based on peak shaving and CO2 reduction effect: A case study in Japan

Microgrids are an attractive way to deal with energy depletion and environmental deterioration as well as grid pressure. However, the energy configurations of microgrids comprising various uncertain and variable resources are significantly sophisticated. Focusing on the peak shaving ability and carbon reduction effect of microgrids, this paper proposes a multi-criteria evaluation method that aims to maximize the comprehensive value of microgrids. To unify these criteria with different perspectives when solving the optimization problem, the peak shaving and emission reduction effects are converted into economies through peak load cost and carbon tax rather than using the weighting method. The results of a case study in Higashida, Japan obviously evidenced the superiority of multi-objective optimization. Although the improvement of the peak shaving ability and emission reduction effect was partially at the expense of system cost benefit, the total cost under multi-criteria was still reduced by 2.13%, which indicates that the balance and optimization of the economic benefit, peak shaving and carbon reduction were realized. The effect of each evaluation criterion on the optimal configuration was analyzed by comparing the optimization results under objective functions with different criteria combinations. High requirements for carbon reduction can promote the development of renewable energy, and peak shaving ability should be ensured by controllable and stable power generators.

Residential relocation for landslide prone residences in the upper Ciujung watershed

Lebak Regency, which is in Banten Province, is an area in Indonesia that has many years affected by the landslide disaster. Banten Province itself is a disaster-prone area. In Indonesia, Banten Province is a province with a fairly high hazard rating according to BNPB in the Indonesian Disaster-Prone Index book. Landslide disasters often occur in regions of Indonesia that have diverse topographies. Landslides can cause various kinds of losses like physically, socially, and economically. In early 2020, Lebak Regency experienced flash floods which leads to many residential areas especially areas on the upper ciujung watershed to be affected by landslide. From this disaster that happened on 1st January 2020 alone, 20 bridges were damaged in the 6 affected sub-districts. The analysis in this study used the Spatial Multi-Criteria Evaluation (SMCE) method and an overlay. This study aims to produce locations which have the potential to be relocation areas for landslide prone residences in the Upper Ciujung Watershed which includes 5 district, Cipanas District, Lebakgedong District, Sajira District, Muncang District, and Sobang District. From this research, it was found that areas that have the potential to be the location of residential relocation are only in 4 of the sub-districts within the research areas with a total area of 88.12 Ha which is in the eastern part of Cipanas District, southeast of Lebakgedong District, and also in the western part of Muncang District.

The improvement of method for the multi-criteria evaluation of the effectiveness of the control of the structure and parameters of interference protection of special-purpose radio communication systems

Military radio communication systems are the basis of special purpose control systems and the object of the enemy’s primary influence. Therefore, the issue of increasing the noise immunity of military radio communication systems is important and needs further research. Thus, the object of the research was chosen to be a military radio communication system. Maintaining a given level of noise immunity for military radio systems is one of the key issues in radio resource management, the effective management of which allows the use of the entire suitable frequency range for the transmission (reception) of electromagnetic energy by radio electronic devices. A number of works have been devoted to the ways search for increasing the noise immunity of military radio communication systems. One such way is to develop new (improve existing) approaches for assessing the effectiveness of military radio interference management. This work solves the problem of improving the method of multicriteria management effectiveness evaluation of the structure and parameters of the military radio systems noise protection. The scientific problem is solved by the devices of multicriteria estimation of the of noise protection level of the military radio communication system, graphic display of the executed and not executed tasks, the aggregation scheme of formation of the integrated estimation of noise protection. The research used scientific methods of analysis and synthesis, also the theory provisions of signal-code structures and the provisions of the complex technical systems theory. The peculiarity of the proposed improvement of the methodology is the multi-criteria assessment of the noise immunity level of the military radio communication system in the conditions of radio electronic conflict. The proposed technique allows: – to evaluate the effectiveness of noise protection management; – to substantiate the optimal configuration of the military radio communication system in solving the problems of noise protection management in the conditions of radio electronic conflict; – to identify the ways to increase noise immunity at the stage of operational management of the military radio communication system in the conditions of electronic conflict. The results of the research should be used in assessing the effectiveness of management of noise protection of military radio communication systems and determining the optimal structure and parameters of military radio systems.

Application of Integrated Watershed Management Measures to Minimize the Land Use Change Impacts

Non-point source pollution is a major factor in excessive nutrient pollution that can result in the eutrophication. Land use/land cover (LULC) change, as a result of urbanization and agricultural intensification (e.g., increase in the consumption of fertilizers), can intensify this pollution. An informed LULC planning needs to consider the negative impacts of such anthropogenic activities to minimize the impact on water resources. The objective of this study was to inform future land use planning by considering nutrient reduction goals. We modeled the LULC dynamics and determined the capacity for future agricultural development by considering its impacts on nitrate runoff at a watershed scale in the Tajan River Watershed in northeastern Iran. We used the Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) to simulate the in-stream nitrate concentration on a monthly timescale in this watershed. Historical LULCs (years 1984, 2001 and 2010) were derived via remote sensing and were applied within the Land Change Modeler to project future LULC in 2040 under a business-as-usual scenario. To reduce nitrate pollution in the watershed and ecological protection, a conservation scenario was developed using a multi-criteria evaluation method. The results indicated that the implementation of the conservation scenario can substantially reduce the nitrate runoff (up to 72%) compared to the business-as-usual scenario. These results can potentially inform regional policy makers in strategic LULC planning and minimizing the impact of nitrate pollution on watersheds. The proposed approach can be used in other watersheds for informed land use planning by considering nutrient reduction goals.

An MCE-based innovative approach to evaluating ecotourism suitability using GIS

Geographic Information System (GIS) can be used in ecotourism as a decision support tool for sustainable tourism planning, impact assessment, visitor flow management, and tourism site selection. Therefore, this system has the potential to be widely applied in tourism. The purpose of the study was to explore the potential for ecotourism development using GIS in Sepidan region, placed in the southwestern part of Iran. An innovative method was proposed for adjusting effective parameters in evaluation of ecotourism. The methods used for evaluation comprised Boolean, current multi-criteria evaluation methods (weighted linear combination), and the proposed methods of geometric mean and its calibration. Results showed that an improved method using geometric mean (kappa= 0.72) was better than Boolean (kappa= 0.56) and multi-criteria evaluation (kappa= 0.59) models. The calibrated geometric mean was also the best among the different models used. It should be noted that the geometric mean method was simpler than multi-criteria evaluation and did not require the weighting process.

Stakeholder Involvement for Sustainable Energy Development Based on Uncertain Group Decision Making: Prioritizing the Renewable Energy Heating Technologies and the BWM-WASPAS-IN Approach

This paper proposes a multi-criteria decision framework for promotion of the heating systems based on the renewable energy sources. The objective and subjective data are taken into consideration by the virtue of the relevant quantitative techniques. The paper integrates the Best-Worst method (BWM) and modifies the Weighted Aggregated Sum Product Assessment (WASPAS) method. The BWM is utilized for eliciting the weights of the criteria during the expert survey. We apply the interval-normalized WASPAS for the multi-criteria ranking of the heating technologies. Thus, the uncertainty is taken into consideration. The empirical application deals with the case of Lithuania where modernization of the heating system is rather important in order to reduce energy poverty and increase the quality of life. Three heating technologies (i.e. heat pumps, solar heating and wood pellet boilers) are assessed through the expert survey and multi-criteria evaluation methods. The multi-criteria analysis suggests wood pellet boilers and solar heating dominate the heat pumps in terms of the overall utility and could be promoted as the most suitable renewable heating technologies.