A multi-criteria decision-making tool to identify optimal locations for PV-geothermal systems for heating and cooling in industrial areas

Resumen

The consequences of climate change and the urgent need in the EU to produce our self-clean energy from renewable resources are rapidly changing the rules. To meet the goal to produce our energy with 45% from the renewable resource for 2030, the diversification of the renewable resources to use to produce our energy is compulsory, and not only from solar and wind. Renewable energy hybrid systems are proven to be the most energy efficient and emissions savers as they take most of the natural resources intermittently, which is usually a drawback for a single renewable energy system. Spain (along with Portugal) accounts for the highest yearly radiation rates, which energy is mainly used to produce electricity. Moreover, in Spain, 31% of the total energy is consumed by industry eminently consumed in Industrial parks, considered energy-consumers hotspots. Therefore, a hybrid PV-geothermal system is proposed as a more efficient system to produce heat and cold from renewables for the industry, both for industrial processes and heating and cooling. However, Spain shows very different orography and climate conditions along its territory, provoking different performance ratios of the proposed hybrid systems. Among the most influential factors affecting these systems' environmental and economic performance are the yearly solar irradiation, the energy demand, and the geothermal resource potential that differ in a spatial component. In this work, a Multicriteria Decision Making (MCDM) tool is created and applied to spatially assess the performance of these systems and identify the optimal zones for PV-geothermal hybrid facilities based on the main spatial environmental factors. The tool is applied in high energy industrial demand areas from the new "Heat map of Spain" (Ecology Transition and demographic challenge Ministry of Spain) and is developed in a GIS environment. The main results expected are the performance indicators of PV-geothermal systems in Spain for the industrial sectors and the selection of the optimal zones of these systems in Spain based on the energy demand, solar irradiation, and geothermal potential.