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Authors
Abstract(s)
The European Commission is increasingly pressuring its members to become carbon neutral. Wherefore, it is pertinent to develop a decision support tool for investing in renewable energy projects customised for each member of the European Union. To accomplish this objective, the use of Data envelopment analysis (DEA) was considered appropriate, either through CRS models or VRS, when possible, as the valuation method for the various existing investment options. Therefore, based on the primary renewable sources described by IRENA, geothermal energy, hydropower, solar energy (photovoltaic and thermal) and wind energy (onshore and offshore), it was possible to build 62 portfolios through their combinations. In this way, each investment option is mirrored as DMUs that will be evaluated on four different thematic: economic, technology, environmental and social, thus resulting in what will be defined as sustainable efficiency. With the objective of exploring different alternatives for the inclusion of themes in the models, four hypotheses were developed, considering the use of weight restriction, the equal distribution of the weight of energies in the portfolios and alternatives for the representation of the technological thematic in the model. The inclusion of more comprehensive variables from the four previously mentioned groups allows the reduction of the gap in the evaluation of renewable energy investment projects, considering the most studied factors in the academic environment over the years, and, thus, allowing a more sustainable vision. The support tool was personalised in this Business Project, considering the German context. In this sense, it was intended to collect the German figures of the representative variables and to perceive the usefulness of the developed models' results. After the elaboration of the models, it was possible to perceive that several suffered from difficulties in discriminating the DMUs; however, their results showed significant similarities in terms of the average evaluation of efficiency and the number of efficient DMUs between the VRS models and between the models CRS, with exceptions. In total, 19 different DMUs were considered efficient, of which 12 were shared by three or more models of the different hypotheses. Taking into account their compositions, it was perceived the substantial importance of wind energy, particularly onshore and solar energy, especially photovoltaic, thus corresponding to the energy sources highlighted as fundamental for the conversion of the economy into a greener one by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Protection. Despite the presence of several limitations, such as the lack of data related to the German context, or the impossibility of implementing restrictions to create a lower limit on the weight of the variables, it is possible to observe the inherent value of DEA as a tool that enhances opportunities and allows a possible resolution of problems in complex contexts. Regardless this project insights, further studies are recommended, considering additional renewable energies, such as Bioenergy and the use of DEA models that better consider the complexity of the renewable energy environment, such as the geometric efficiency model. Additionally, inserting new comprehensive variables representing the four thematic would be advantageous for perceiving the capacity and the relative differences in the evaluation of DMUs through this method. Nevertheless, DEA seems to prove to be a valuable and transparent tool in analysing investment possibilities, thus serving as an essential support to decision-makers.
Description
Keywords
Data envelopment analysis German renewable energy efficiency evaluation Sustainable efficiency Renewable energy portfolios evaluation Weight restrictions European Union renewable energy sector