Abstract

EU energy and climate policies continue to drive interest in biomass fuel pellets which can be produced from a wide variety of feedstock. The use of multi-criteria decision analysis (MCDA) to support feedstock selection has the potential for more transparent and better decision-making. This study applies the behavioural TOPSIS, a prominent MCDA technique, to rank pellets for energy use in Sweden produced from under-utilised forest and agricultural biomass. Seven criteria were used to assess and rank the biomass pellets. The alternatives include 88 types of pellets from 11 biomass materials. Possible attitudes of an expert towards the risk of losses (risk averse, risk neutral and risk-seeking) were combined with six sets of criteria weights obtained using six weighting methods - a total of 18 input settings (scenarios). Despite having different input settings, almost identical results were obtained in all scenarios, meaning that the rankings were stable and consistent. Across all 18 scenarios, pellets produced from a reference spruce/pine sawdust blend are ranked ahead of other pellet types. Pellets produced from Scots pine bark exhibited stable and consistent rankings across all scenarios; and thus this biomass is the second-best overall. The next best materials overall are poplar, reed canary grass and wheat straw, whereas torrefied pellets (torrefied beech, poplar and wheat straw) were ranked last in all scenarios. Combining behavioural TOPSIS and a variety of criteria-weighting methods is a meaningful way of improving decision-making with respect to producing a more valid and reliable ranking of biomass fuel pellets for energy use in Sweden.& COPY; 2023 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).

Keywords

Multi-criteria decision analysis; Behavioural TOPSIS; Criteria weighting methods; Pellet quality; Biofuel

Published in

Energy Reports
2023, Volume: 10, pages: 706-718

SLU Authors

• Agar, David

  • Department of Forest Biomaterials and Technology, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
    

• Rudolfsson, Magnus

  • Department of Forest Biomaterials and Technology, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
    

• Blagojevic, Bosko

  • Department of Forest Biomaterials and Technology, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
    
  • University of Novi Sad

Sustainable Development Goals

Ensure access to affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy for all
Take urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts


UKÄ Subject classification

Renewable Bioenergy Research
Economics


Publication identifier

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.egyr.2023.07.007

Permanent link to this page (URI)

https://res.slu.se/id/publ/122811