Weighting factor elicitation for sustainability assessment of energy technologies

In this paper, an approach for sustainability assessment of innovative energy technologies is expanded bymulti-criteria decision analysis (MCDA) methods to aggregate indicator results and support decisionmaking.One of the most important steps for MCDA is to determine weighting factors for individualindicators. Thus, a workshop was performed to elicit weighting factors for sustainability assessments ofenergy technologies from developers of such technologies and energy system modellers fromacademia. These stakeholders expressed their preferences with respect to sustainability criteria using theSimple Multi Attribute Rating Technique (SMART). A triple bottom line approach of sustainabledevelopment was used as the basis for the aggregation of indicator results. This approach is based onLife Cycle Costing, Life Cycle Assessment and social indicators. Obtained weighting factors were appliedto an integrative sustainability assessment with the aggregation method Preference Ranking OrganizationMETHod for Enrichment of Evaluations (PROMETHEE). Hydrogen-based mobility as an importanttechnology to foster decarbonization in the transport sector is used as a case study for the application ofthe derived weighting factors. A conventional vehicle, powered by fossil fuel, is compared with a fuel cellelectric vehicle (FCEV) for the year 2050. Different options (pipeline, compressed gaseous hydrogen,liquid hydrogen, liquid organic hydrogen carrier) are discussed for the supply of hydrogen. The resultsfor this weighting factor set are compared with an equal weighting scenario of the three sustainabilitydimensions and indicators within one sustainability dimension. The FCEV, using pipelines for hydrogensupply, came out first in the assessment as well as in all sensitivity analyses