Evaluation of the current status and sustainability of biogas power plants in Turkey via Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP)

Date

2023-12

Author

Güven, Ebru Selen

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The production of energy is responsible for 87% of global greenhouse gases (GHGs) emissions since 2020. The global biogas industry can reduce GHG emissions by 10% by 2030 via biogas power plants. Yet, the implementation of biogas power plants in Turkey faces several sustainability challenges. This thesis study aims to firstly, gather information on biogas power plants operating in Turkey about their technical, environmental, social, and economic aspects and secondly, evaluate the current status and sustainability of the biogas power plants via the Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP). In pursuit of the study's goals, two surveys, namely the General Biogas Power Plant Survey and the AHP Survey, were developed. 20 biogas power plants attended the General Biogas Power Plant Survey out of 95 plants. The sample size used in this thesis reflects a close profile to that of biogas power plants in Turkey regarding the installed power capacity profile and feedstock type profile vs. related power capacity profile. For the AHP study, 21 selected experts, which are academicians, decision- makers, finance experts, biogas power plant employees and consultants, attended the AHP survey for prioritization of indicators and sub-indicators. The methane productivities reported by the biogas power plants that attended the survey exhibited notable variability from 0.6 to 20000 m3 CH4/m3reactor.day. Both survey results show that methane yield and methane productivity are critical parameters for sustainable energy and need to be improved by biogas power plants. The parallel results from both surveys revealed that using waste heat in the facilities is not a priority. AHP study and pair-wise comparison results indicated that the most prominent sub-indicators are payback period (0.118), water consumption (0.094) and energy production efficiency (0.074). Several establishing and enforcing standards are needed to improve sustainable biogas power plants.

Subject Keywords

Sustainability, Biogas, Multi-Criteria Decision Making, Analytic Hierarchy Process

URI

https://hdl.handle.net/11511/107778

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Graduate School of Natural and Applied Sciences, Thesis