Benefits and costs in selecting fuel for municipality heating systems with the Analytic Hierarchy Process

Abstract

Municipal economy problems are of a complex nature. Existing requirements for sustainable development make us apply various criteria while solving these problems. These can, for example, include economic, financial, social and environmental criteria. To handle them effectively, multi-criteria analysis should be applied. Decisions about heat production and delivery systems belong to such multidisciplinary problems. They were usually resolved in the past using classical numerical methodology that took into account only the technical and economic merits of the various alternatives. By applying multi-criteria tools instead it is possible to obtain more realistic results and make more effective decisions. The Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) seems to be a good alternative to fill the existing gap between decision-making as it is actually practiced and the traditional methods when applied to selecting district heating (DH) systems. This paper presents such an application. Our application is to select the best heat energy source for a DH system for a medium sized city located in Poland. Our results led to an interesting conclusion with regard to the best heat energy source. Our results suggest that intensifying the effort to make widespread the use of more efficient, but financially more costly, energy sources is the best.

Keywords

AHP / municipal economy / district heating systems / heat energy sources / optimization / MCDM / sustainable development

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