A Multi-Criteria Decision Making (MCDM) for Renewable Energy Plants Location Selection in Vietnam under a Fuzzy Environment

Abstract

In the context of increasing energy demands in Vietnam, and as a result of the limited supply of domestic energy (oil/gas/coal reserves are exhausted), the potential for renewable energy sources in Vietnam is significant. Thus, building wind power plants in Vietnam is necessary. Access to this type of renewable energy not only contributes to society’s energy supply but also helps to save energy and reduce environmental pollution. Although some works have reviewed applications of the Multi-Criteria Decision Making (MCDM) model in wind power plant site selection, little research has focused on this problem in a fuzzy environment. This is the reason why a hybrid Fuzzy Analytic Hierarchy Process (FAHP) and The Technique for Order of Preference by Similarity to Ideal Solution (TOPSIS) are developed for wind power plant site selection in Vietnam. In the first stages of this research, an FAHP model is proposed for determining the weight of each potential location for building a wind power plant, based on qualitative and quantitative factors. A TOPSIS is applied for ranking all potential alternatives in the final stage. The authors collected data from seven locations, which have good conditions for investment in a wind power plant. The results indicate that Binh Thuan (Binh Thuan Province is located on coast of South Central Vietnam) is the best place for building a wind power plant in Vietnam. The contributions of this work proposed an MCDM approach under fuzzy environments for wind power plant location selection in Vietnam. This paper also resides in the evolution of a new approach that is flexible and practical for a decision-maker. This work also provides a useful guideline for wind power plant location selection in others countries.