Developed analytic hierarchy process and multi criteria decision support system for wind farm site selection using GIS: A regional-scale application with environmental responsibility

• Published in: Energy conversion and management. X 2024-04, Vol.22, p.100594, Article 100594
• Main Authors: Yousefi, Hossein, Moradi, Siamak, Zahedi, Rahim, Ranjbar, Zohreh
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: AHP; Decision Support Systems; MCDM; Renewable Energy; Wind farm
• ISSN: 2590-1745; 2590-1745
• DOI: 10.1016/j.ecmx.2024.100594

•Integrating the Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) and Geographic Information Systems (GIS)•Conducting exhaustive review of relevant academic literature identifying similar scholars and their criteria.•Using criteria based on previous wind energy studies, in collaboration with local and national specialists and consistent with Iranian energy market regulations.•Developing a new analytic hierarchy process in order to be used for wind energy potential measurements. As determined by empirical analysis, renewable energy sources account for less than 1.73 percent of the developing countries energy market. The western region of Iran, or province of Kermanshah, presents significant opportunities for power exports to neighboring country (Iraq). In this research, an appropriate location for wind farms in Western Iran is determined with the assistance of a combined method of Geographic Information Systems (GIS) and Multi-Criteria Decision Making (MCDM) description. Electrical, techno-economic, environmental, and geo-infrastructure aspects, as well as their respective sub-criteria, were subjected to a comprehensive analysis and weighting in this study. The Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) was utilized to achieve this result. The aforementioned conclusions were reached through an extensive examination of insightful interviews conducted with esteemed experts in the domain of wind energy. Significant suitability for the potential installation of large-scale wind turbines or wind farms is evident in six critical areas, encompassing more than 20 % of the evaluated region, according to the findings of this paper. Conversely, it was deduced that precisely 80 % of the areas examined were deemed inappropriate for such endeavors. The assessment yielded four locations that were deemed suitable, denoted as A, B, C, and D. The southern, western, and central regions of the province contain these locations. The proposed total capacity is 216 MW, which is determined by the combined surface areas of these regions (19 km2, 55 km2, 64 km2, and 40 km2, respectively). An anticipated reduction of 1,262,471 tons in greenhouse gas emissions is anticipated as a result of the implementation and substitution of the proposed wind farms for the gas turbine power plants that presently predominate in Iran's thermal power plant sector. The method used in this article can be extended to all cases of other faculties to measure the potential of wind farm resources.