Evaluating sustainability of biofuels feedstocks: A multi-objective framework for supporting decision making

Different economic and environmental theories and approaches have been used to date to evaluate effectiveness of biofuels policies, efficiency of biofuels production or sustainability of different biofuels technologies. The most commonly known approaches include, e.g., Life Cycle Analysis, cost-effectiveness analysis, contingent valuation, GIS-based models, and market and price related analysis. This paper is focused on a multi-objective decision analysis that, although well established in economic and environmental evaluation theory, has not been widely used yet to assess biofuels production or policies. The paper presents a fuzzy set theory based multi-objective framework for evaluating conventional and advanced biofuels feedstocks in the US; considering uncertainties of decision-making processes. It incorporates fuzzy set theory, expert elicitation and the PROMETHEE approach to determine the sustainability potential of the feedstocks in terms of multiple economic, environmental and social policy objectives. The study shows algae and switchgrass to be the most sustainable feedstocks, while corn that is currently the most important feedstock for ethanol production in the US, has the lowest sustainability potential among the analyzed feedstocks. The study presents an example of a participatory approach and recommends. its application for designing policy measures in an interactive process with policymakers. (C) 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.