A life-cycle based decision-making framework for electricity generation system planning

This thesis proposed a decision-making framework to consider multiple objectives in long-term planning situations, and asserts that planning for power generation systems should consider relevant environmental and/or social objectives at the same decision level as traditional economic or reliability objectives. The framework was applied to the case study of long-term planning for Ontario's power generation system. The framework integrates life-cycle based information and decision-maker preferences toward multiple objectives in the context of sustainable development. Six decision criteria evaluated as measures of the objectives include life-cycle cost of electricity, a system flexibility indicator, demand reduction, land use requirements, greenhouse gas emissions, and air emissions. Stakeholder values were derived through questionnaires. Three hypothetical electricity generation scenarios were compared to test the decision-making framework. The results of the application indicated that the scenario which included aggressive renewable energy development and demand reduction was favourable, even given the tradeoffs of reliability and costs.