Power source evaluation using hybrid Monte Carlo simulation and analytic hierarchy process

The evaluation of power plants is a multi-criteria decision making problem given the number of criteria involved in the process. In this paper, ten power plants are evaluated based on technological, sustainability, and economic criteria. Considering that a more technologically advanced power plant is assumed to be more sustainable, the technological and sustainability criteria are condensed into one criterion, which is further divided into four sub-criteria: efficiency coefficient, availability, capacity, and reserved-to-production ratio. The economic criterion is also divided into four sub-criteria: capital cost, operation and maintenance cost (fixed or variable), fuel cost, and external cost. This research evaluates the ten power plants using an integrated approach that combines Monte Carlo (MC) simulation and Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP). The simulation-based MC-AHP approach is very efficient, primarily because the decision maker is allowed to represent his/her judgment for each pair-wise comparison as a random distribution (e.g., Triangular distribution), instead of the single estimates used in conventional AHP methods. Moreover, this approach produces more accurate results by reducing the uncertainty associated with single estimates in the conventional AHP. Among the ten power plants evaluated, the results of this research showed that the hydro plant performs the best, while the photovoltaic plant performs the worst.