Sustainable Cities and Society 87 (2022) 104170

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Sustainable Cities and Society

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Evaluation of a stand-alone CHP-Hybrid system using a multi-criteria

decision making due to the sustainable development goals
Ashkan Toopshekan, Parisa Rahdan, Mohammad Amin Vaziri Rad, Hossein Yousefi *,
Fatemeh Razi Astaraei
Department of Renewable Energies and Environment, Faculty of New Sciences and Technologies, University of Tehran, Tehran, Iran

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Keywords: The world today revolves around energy, especially in the forms of electricity and heat. Distributed microgrids
Hybrid energy system that incorporate renewable energy sources with conventional fossil fuels have especially gained strong mo­
Multi-criteria decision making mentum for providing power to rural areas. The present paper discusses the optimization of a hybrid system
Sensitivity analysis
composed of CHP-based diesel generators (DG), a natural gas boiler, photovoltaics (PV), wind turbines (WT), and
Sustainable development goals
Combined heat and power
a battery bank (BAT) under tropical weather conditions. The HOMER optimization algorithm and sensitivity
analysis tool are used to analyze the effect of project variables such as component prices, renewable resources
potential, power grid breakeven distance, and power consumption profile on performance. The optimum sce­
nario using only economic factors and assuming cycle charging is a PV/WT/DG/BAT/Boiler system with 6 kW of
WT, 7.55 kW of PV, 10 kW of DG, and 21 kWh of battery that can achieve a 0.143 $/kWh cost of energy with a
renewable fraction of 37.1%. Implementation of TOPSIS method considering sustainable development goals for
criteria weighting eliminates the DG, and leads to a 100% renewable configuration of PV/WT/BAT/Boiler with
18 kW of WT, 33.2 kW of PV, 119 kWh of battery, and 0.301 $/kWh cost of energy. The main contribution of this
study can be seen in providing a new approach for weighting the TOPSIS multi-criteria decision-making process
based on UN sustainable development goals. Furthermore, comparing the economic optimization results with
multi-criteria optimization results for a stand-alone CHP unit provides a critical point of view on studies with a
single-objective decision making process.

Artificial intelligence methods and computer software used in sizing

1. Introduction
Nowadays access to affordable, clean, and reliable energy services is
essential for basic human needs. The inevitable exhaustion of traditional
fossil fuels coinciding with the expansion of energy consumption com­
pels governments and nations to take advantage of new energy sources
(He et al., 2021). Although, renewable energy is considered to be rather
less reliable compared to conventional power plants due to power pro­
duction uncertainties and mismatches in the times of generation and
consumption (Talaat et al., 2022) A storage unit can of course be used to
solve this problem, but it greatly increases the cost of the system.
Therefore, the high cost of hybrid renewable systems forces designers to
carefully evaluate the power requirements and perform a precise sizing
process to minimize the energy costs. Accordingly, the need for simul­
taneous use of several energy sources along with storage systems in
stand-alone hybrid systems emphasizes the importance of targeted
optimization methods (Baneshi & Hadianfard, 2016).
are divided into different general groups, all of which improve upon a
generated initial population until the desired response is reached.
MATLAB software is used for conducting optimization algorithms in
many research papers. Pyomo, EnergyPlus, REopt, iHOGA, and other
software are also used to optimize power generation systems. But among
all these tools, HOMER (hybrid optimization of multiple energy re­
sources) software, designed by the national renewable energy laboratory
of the US, is one of the most useful ones (Sinha & Chandel, 2014).
Optimizing the simultaneous supply of electricity and heat to meet
stand-alone demands, despite creating higher energy efficiency, is also a
very complex process that researchers around the world are endeavoring
to improve.
In recent years, research on combining heat and power (CHP) sys­
tems which incorporate renewable technologies has increased because
of their enhanced energy efficiency and environmental benefits as a
result of capturing waste heat when generating electricity (Barbieri,
Spina & Venturini, 2012; Komeili, Nazarian, Safari & Moradlou, 2022).

* Corresponding author.
E-mail address: Hosseinyousefi@ut.ac.ir (H. Yousefi).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scs.2022.104170
Received 22 June 2022; Received in revised form 9 September 2022; Accepted 9 September 2022
Available online 21 September 2022
2210-6707/© 2022 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
A. Toopshekan et al.
Nomenclature
AHP analytic hierarchy process
ANP analytic network process
BAT Battery
C closeness coefficient
CHP combined heat and power
COE cost of energy
DD diesel dependency
DG diesel generator
ERF electrical renewable fraction
EXel excess electricity
EXth excess thermal
FC fuel cell generator
HOMER hybrid optimization of multiple energy resources
HR heat recovery
HT hydro turbine
IC initial cost
Bagherian et al. reviewed optimization techniques for hybrid renewable
energy systems utilizing CHP and CCHP, showing that the most popular
types of optimization were Economic and techno-economic. They
concluded that evolutionary algorithms like GA and PSO could help to
optimize the performance of such systems (Bagherian, Mehranzamir,
Pour & Rezania, 2021). Maleki et al. optimized a grid-connected CHP
system consisting of a wind turbine and hydrogen fuel cell by using a
MOPSO algorithm. Their results showed that hybridization with CHP is
an economical and reliable method for supplying energy demands, even
though thermal energy storage equipment for a residential building is
still expensive (Maleki & Rosen, 2017). Sagani et al. prepared a viability
assessment of a CHP system including wind turbine (WT), diesel
generator (DG), photovoltaics (PV), and battery storage for off-grid
residential usage. The initial investment in the CHP systems was
deemed too expensive to be developed without financial support and
incentives for home users, but the biggest advantage was the reduction
of carbon dioxide emissions by 13.5 tons per year (Sagani, Vrettakos &
Dedoussis, 2017). Castellanos et al. showed that a biogas CHP with solar
panels could provide peak load and about 60% of the off-grid energy
demand for a rural area in India. They also stated that the use of hybrid
renewable systems for remote areas in developing countries would
improve the quality of life and create local business and research op­
portunities (Castellanos, Walker, Poggio, Pourkashanian & Nimmo,
2015). Shah et al. stated that coupling of CHP with PV-Battery systems
for an off-grid residential house would overcome the problem of the
periodicity of photovoltaic energy production, reduce emissions and
bring about economic benefits for the consumer (Shah, Mundada &
Pearce, 2015). Batas-Bjelic et al. by simulated a smart urban energy grid
with PVs, WTs, and a CHP system. They showed that due to the flexi­
bility of these networks in classifying energy prices plus the use of
additional electricity through heat storage energy costs could be
reduced even lower than market prices (Batas-Bjelic, Rajakovic & Duic,
2017). Isa et al. hybridized solar panels, fuel cells, and batteries with a
CHP system for a grid-connected hospital in Malaysia and again showed
that though installing CHP is too expensive, it can reduce the energy
generation costs by 30% (Isa, Das, Tan, Yatim & Lau, 2016). Kim et al.
conducted a case study in a residential and commercial building in
Atlanta to investigate the effect of the hybridization of solar panels and
microturbines with absorption chillers. They concluded that using waste
heat would improve the thermal, and electrical efficiency of the system
and also, reduces energy costs, energy consumption, and emissions
(Kim, James & Crittenden, 2017). Waqar et al. analyzed a
grid-connected CHP plant including PV, DG and battery in Pakistan,
showing significant economic benefits resulting from a waste heat
2
Sustainable Cities and Society 87 (2022) 104170
MCDM multi criteria decision making
MOPSO Multi-objective particle swarm optimization
N normalized matrix
NGD natural gas dependency
NPC net present cost
O&M operation and maintenance
OC operation cost
ORF overall renewable fraction
PV photovoltaic panel
SDG sustainable development goal
SWARA stepwise weight assessment ratio analysis
TOPSIS technique for order of preference by similarity to ideal
solution
UN united nations
V weighted normalized matrix
W weight matrix
WT wind turbine
X decision matrix
recovery system (Waqar et al., 2017). Effatnejad et al. analyzed a hybrid
system with PV, WT, and CHP with two different storage systems,
concluding that because of lower cost and better compatibility with the
grid, using batteries instead of an electrolyzer-hydrogen tank as a stor­
age system is recommended (Effatnejad, Rezapour & Vazinram, 2018).
Local economic elements are always an impactful factor when
analyzing a system’s cost efficiency, which is why case studies are
considered valuable. The internal rate of return for CHP systems is
significantly influenced by the energy pricing policies of each country.
In Iran, compared to European countries, there is less willingness to use
combined heat and power systems because of lower energy prices. Other
energy sources do not have the opportunity to compete with the usual
way of purchasing power from the grid because of enormous energy
subsidies. Khoshbazan et al. designed a Micro-CHP system with a pow­
ered photovoltaic Stirling engine to supply the energy requirements of a
house in three different climates of Iran. Their results showed that this
system has the largest reduction in carbon dioxide production, and
despite good energy savings, the return of investment period is almost
long (Khoshbazan, Ahmadi, Ming, Arjmand & Rahimzadeh, 2018).
When optimizing a hybrid system, the final objective function is
usually determined based on economic indicators, leading to selections
with higher surplus electricity (technical weakness) and pollution
(environmental challenge) plus low diversity of energy sources (low
energy security) as the optimal scenario. Many researchers have used
multi-objective optimization algorithms directly, or multi-criteria deci­
sion-making after economic optimization, to solve this problem. Table 1
represents the indicators and weighting methods used in some recent
studies in the field of multi-criteria decision-making on optimum hybrid
energy systems. As seen from the table, the most important criteria for
the selection of an optimum hybrid energy system are economic, envi­
ronmental, technical, social, and energy security parameters. However,
choosing equal weights for these parameters is one of the challenges that
can reduce the accuracy of the final decision (Salameh, Sayed, Abdel­
kareem, Olabi & Rezk, 2021). Many researchers have adopted MCDM
using different methods; but the Entropy (Shannon), the analytic hier­
archy process (AHP), and the analytic network process (ANP) are the
most common methods used in the calculation of criteria weights.
Furthermore, the stepwise weight assessment ratio analysis (SWARA)
method is a policy-based method that does not work on a
pairwise-comparison basis unlike the other common methods (Behzad,
Hashemkhani Zolfani, Pamucar & Behzad, 2020). Therefore, choosing
appropriate weights encompassing all aspects of sustainable develop­
ment becomes a challenge if there is no proper vision of existing criteria
policies, or no willingness to directly involve experts’ opinions in
A. Toopshekan et al. Sustainable Cities and Society 87 (2022) 104170

Table 1
Recent studies on the multi-criteria decision-making process in the optimization of small-scale rural HRES.
Study Country, year Application System Demand algorithm Decision-making Weighting
targets (number of method
indicators)

(Fioriti, Poli, Uganda, Rural village PV/DG/Bat 86 kW peak MDO-PSO Economic (2) Non
Duenas-Martinez & 2022 Technical (3)
Micangeli, 2022)
(Musbah, Ali, Aly & Little, _, 2022 Remote village WT/DG/ 89.1 kW peak Machine learning- Economic (1) AHP & FAHP
2022) Internal based algorithms Technical (2)
combustion Environmental (1)
generator Social (1)
(Hassan, Das & Hasan, Bangladesh, Remote community PV/WT/BG/HT/ 216.6 kW peak NSGA-II Economic (1) Non
2022) 2022 Bat Social (2)
(Hosseini Dehshiri, 2022) Iran, 2022 Rural household PV/WT/DG/FC/ 2.4 kW peak HOMER Economical (3) SWARA, EDAS
Bat Environmental (3) & VIKOR
(Ke, Liu, Meng, Fang & China, 2022 Urban energy Grid/PV/WT/ _ 4-dimension plan Economic (2) BWM-CRITIC-
Zhuang, 2022) demand NG/Bat selection Technical (3) VIKOR
Environmental (2)
Social (2)
(Juanpera, Ferrer-Martí & Nigeria, 2022 Remote community PV/WT/DG/Bat 248 MWh/year MILP Economic (2) Non
Pastor, 2022) Technical (4)
Environmental (3)
Social (3)
(Khan, Pal & Saeed, 2021) India, 2022 Rural consumer PV/WT/DG/Bat 11 kW peak HOMER Economic (4) Non
Technical (4)
Environmental (4)
Social (3)
(Elavarasan, Leoponraj, India, 2021 College building Grid/DG/PV/ 84 kW peak HOMER Economic (3) Fuzzy-AHP
Vishnupriyan, Dheeraj & FC/Bat Technical (2) (FAHP)
Gangaram Sundar, 2021) Environmental (1)
(Ullah, Elkadeem, Kotb, Pakistan, Rural village Grid/PV/WT/ 2764.7 kW HOMER Economic (1) FAHP &
Taha & Wang, 2021) 2021 BG/HT/Bat peak Technical (1) MOORA
Environmental (1)
Social (2)
(Elkadeem et al., 2021) Egypt, 2021 Urban city PV/WT/NG/Bat 68.2 kW peak HOMER Economic (4) AHP
Technical (3)
Environmental (3)
Social (2)
(Salameh et al., 2021) Saudi Arabia, City demand PV/WT/FC/DG/ 210.1 kW peak HOMER Economic (5) WASPA,
2021 Bat Technical (5) MOORA, &
Environmental (4) EDAS
Energy security (2)
(He et al., 2021) China, 2020 Rural demand Geo/Bio/Solar/ Equal to 400 multi-objective based Economic (4) Multimoora &
Wind households method Technical (3) TOSIS
demand Environmental (2)
Social (4)
(Mazzeo, Baglivo, Matera, Italy, 2020 Grid connected PV/WT/Bat 18 kW peak TRNSYS 17 Economic (3) Non
Congedo & Oliveti, apartments Technical (3)
2020) Environmental (2)

(Andervazh, Javadi & Tehran, 2020 119 buses, 118 WT/Bat 22.7 MW peak multi-objective Economic (-) fuzzy
Aliabadi, 2020) branches and 15 stochastic Technical (-) approach
sectionalizing optimization and
switches and 6000 probabilistic analysis
PHEV
(Diemuodeke, Addo, Oko, Nigeria, 2019 Rural household PV/WT/DG/Bat 1.2 kW peak HOMER Economic (5) Expert opinion
Mulugetta & Ojapah, Technical (2)
2019) Environmental (4)
Social (2)
Energy security (2)

determining weights. A consistent global benchmark that includes all
aspects of sustainable development can help to find the optimal
weighting of indicators based on the specific conditions of each region.
The Sustainable Development Goals developed by the United Nations
are one of the most comprehensive guidelines for the development of
remote and rural communities. This benchmark consists of 17 main
goals with more than 169 targets (Lamichhane, Eğilmez, Gedik, Bhutta
& Erenay, 2021). Many sustainable development goals (SDG) are closely
linked to the quality of available energy in each community, and SDG-17
standards have a flexible design to prioritize important issues for each
region (Mondejar et al., 2021). This feature can be a great advantage for
weighting the criteria for optimizing the energy system. In fact, the use
of a global standard adopted by most governments and having a special
focus on the use of renewable energy sources can provide benefits from
social, environmental, and economic points of view in energy systems
development policy (Bertheau, 2020). In addition, the relations of en­
ergy criteria with each sustainable development goal have been speci­
fied in this benchmark based on the priority of the goals announced by
the United Nations (United National Development Programme (UNDP),
2017). Therefore, in this study, it was decided to use these criteria for
the first time in determining the priority and weight of indicators
affecting the selection of the optimal stand-alone energy system for rural
energy supply.
Based on the aforementioned literature, it can be concluded that
three kinds of sensitivity analysis including component price changes,
type of power consumption profile, and grid breakeven distance are

3
A. Toopshekan et al.
neglected in the prepared CHP results. Also, most studies have focused
on optimization based on economic goals. In this study, all of these are
taken into account for a stand-alone CHP-based DG/Boiler/WT/PV/
Battery system along with technical, economic, and environmental
analysis. Furthermore, an SDG-based multi-objective decision-making
process is provided in MATLAB environment to compare the results
with conventional optimization of the HOMER algorithm. Due to the
flexibility of the indicator prioritization method in this study, the results
can be used by researchers in other parts of the world to perform the
multi-criteria decision-making process based on local conditions.
This study is significant because it analyzes the potential of
weighting the decision-making criteria based on UN SDG-17 goals for a
hybrid energy system that can be applied in any part of the world.
Accordingly, due to the clarity of the UN goals and the level of sus­
tainable development of any region, human intervention in the direct
determination of weights is minimized. The novelty and contribution of
the proposed study can be summarized in the following bullet points:
Fig. 1. Schematic diagram of the considered hybrid energy system.
4
Sustainable Cities and Society 87 (2022) 104170
• Proposing a new idea to improve the results of HOMER software by
entering the optimal scenarios in an MCDM method.
• Comparing the economic optimization results with multi-criteria
optimization results and clarifying the fact that considering eco­
nomic goals independently cannot represent the optimal system.
• providing a novel approach for weighting TOPSIS MCDM process
based on UN sustainable development goals unlike other studies that
use pre-prepared weighting methods.
• Providing a hybrid renewable solution for deprived areas with the
outstanding climate of West Asia as a less noticed kind of energy
system in these areas.
In the following sections, input data, methodology, result and
conclusion are analyzed respectively. The input data section includes the
analysis of environmental data, the electricity and heat consumption,
and the fuel and component prices subsections. The methodology sec­
tion is consistent of schematic of the hybrid system, TOPSIS method,
SDG weights for TOPSIS, power producer equations, economic param­
eters, and objective function definition. Finally, the results section
A. Toopshekan et al. Sustainable Cities and Society 87 (2022) 104170

includes the optimal size of the systems in HOMER, COE comparison,

CHP performance, Economic sensitivity analysis, Load sensitivity anal­
ysis, Grid breakeven distance, and TOPSIS results.

2. System’s description and input data

Due to the high volume and diversity of the input data, this section is
dedicated to detailing the data used in this simulation. In this section,
environmental parameters of the selected area, electricity and heat
consumption, fuel prices, and component costs are investigated in
separate subsections.

2.1. Schematic of the hybrid system Fig. 2. Monthly average solar radiation for Naein, Iran (NASA, 2020).

Fig. 1 demonstrates a schematic diagram of the simulated model

including PV, WT, DG, and battery bank along with a boiler that is
connected to the electrical grid. These sources are considered for sup­
plying both electrical and thermal loads. The WT and DG are connected
to the AC bus bar and the PV and battery are connected to the DC bus
bar. The power converter used here is consist of an inverter (trans­
forming DC to AC) and a rectifier (transforming AC to DC). HOMER
software is used to simulate the proposed hybrid system. This software
calculates the optimal scenario based on the best economic character­
istics (mainly NPC minimization) (Toopshekan, Youse & Astaraei,
2020).
A dispatch strategy is a set of rules used to control the battery bank
and the generator operation whenever the renewable energy is insuffi­ Fig. 3. Monthly average temperature data for Naein, Iran (NASA, 2020).
cient to supply the load. HOMER software employs different dispatch
options. The objective of the dispatch strategy is to control the system so
According to Fig. 4, the wind speed profile is approximately uniform
that the electrical load is met in a satisfactory manner. The dispatch
except for June, July, and August, when the average wind speed sur­
strategy used in this investigation is cycle charging (CC). The process of
passes 7 m/s. In other months, the wind speed remains mostly steady
this dispatch strategy is shown in Fig. 1. The CC dispatch mechanism
and equals 5 to 6 m/s. The total average wind speed in the region is 5.94
forces the generator to operate at its maximum capacity whenever
m/s.
necessary. In this instance, the battery storage unit is charged using the
Therefore, wind potential is suitable for most of the year and solar
extra power.
potential is also appropriate except during the winter season. Since the
As can be seen, HOMER commercial software has a single-criteria
average temperature of the region in different months is not too high,
decision-making process based on just economic objectives for optimal
there will be no significant negative effect on the performance of solar
scenarios. This drawback can lead to optimal scenarios with high
panels caused by overheating.
emissions, high excess (waste) electricity, or high power shortages,
which is against the sustainable development goals. To overcome this
challenge, a well-known multi-criteria decision-making method called 2.3. Electricity and heat consumption
TOPSIS has been used on the outputs of HOMER. But, due to the lack of a
fixed criterion for weighting the parameters and the frequent involve­ In this paper, the profile of electricity and heat consumption of 10
ment of human intervention, this method also has some drawbacks. Due households in Naein city, Iran, has been estimated and then simulated by
to these two drawbacks, in this study, for the first time, the weighing HOMER software for a year based on the tropical condition of the
method is done based on 17 main goals and 169 targets of UN sustain­ selected area. Accordingly, the average daily electricity usage of
able development goals. Based on this, whenever any of the decision- households is 112.7 (kWh/d). As depicted in Fig. 5, the highest elec­
making criteria is effective in any of the 17 sustainable development tricity consumption happens in the summer, from June to August. Also,
goals, its weight ratio increases compared to criteria with lower effec­ the average heat consumption of the residential sections is 125.5 (kWh/
tiveness. Therefore, with this approach, human interference in obtaining d). Fig. 6 shows profiles of heat demand in different months. Although
the weights is minimized. Furthermore, a global energy-related fixed there are power transmission lines in the county of Naein, providing
standard is applied to estimate the weights that can be used in all parts of electricity and heat to residents on the outskirts of small towns in Iran is
the world, the main weakness of the HOMER software is covered, and
the optimal system will be selected based on the criteria of the United
Nations Agenda 2030.

2.2. Analysis of environmental data

As shown in Fig. 2, the highest solar radiation in Naein city, Iran

(Latitude 32.8599◦ N, Longitude 53.0878◦ E) occurs during the summer,
between June and July. The lowest daily radiation is 2.69 (kWh/m2/d)
in December and the highest radiation is 7.28 (kWh/m2/d) in June.
Fig. 3 shows the annual temperature data. The highest average tem­
perature, 28.32 ◦ C, happens in July while the lowest temperature,
2.47 ◦ C, is in January. The importance of ambient temperature lies in
that it could affect PV power production. Fig. 4. Monthly average Wind Speed for Naein, Iran (NASA, 2020).

5
A. Toopshekan et al. Sustainable Cities and Society 87 (2022) 104170

Fig. 5. Monthly electricity consumption of 10 households.

Fig. 6. Monthly heat consumption of 10 households.

always a challenge. Despite the low energy consumption, these areas can
Table 2
use electricity and heat as domestic, industrial, or commercial loads. It
Characteristics of considered power transmission lines (Rad et al., 2020;
should be noted that the residential section experiences the main energy
Jahangir et al., 2020).
challenge due to its lower priority in power supply.
Parameter Data Unit

2.4. Fuel and component prices Type of power plant Conventional-natural gas _
Carbon dioxide emission 661 g/kWh
Sulfur dioxide emission 1.7 g/kWh
Although the purpose of this study is to supply energy in a stand- Nitrogen oxides emission 2.4 g/kWh
alone way, due to the need to compare the pollution level of the pro­ Off-peak power price 0.042 $/kWh
posed hybrid system with the power grid and also optimize the grid Shoulder period power price 0.052 $/kWh
breakeven distance, the national grid characteristics are presented in Peak period power price 0.072 $/kWh
Average grid extension cost 15,000 $/km
this section. Iranian power plants use natural gas as the main fuel for
Maximum annual power outages 50 hours
producing electrical power. The operation lifetime of the power plants’
equipment, system efficiency, and quality of the fuel are the most
important factors affecting the increase of power plants’ emissions. The
Table 3
amount of pollution created by the power plants, according to the En­
The main features of the fuel used in the project (Abdul-Wahab, Charabi,
ergy Balance Sheet of Iran, is given in Table 2. In addition, the estimated
Al-Mahruqi & Osman, 2020).
cost of developing power lines is estimated at between 8000 $/km and
22,000 $/km, based on the difficulty of the terrain which affects Fuel Price Density (kg/ LHV (MJ/ Carbon Content
m3) kg) (%)
installation costs (Jahangir, Fakouriyan, Amin & Rad, 2020).
In this simulation, in addition to the grid, the diesel fuel used in the Diesel 0.20 $/L 820 43.2 88
Natural 0.05 0.79 45 67
DG and the natural gas required for the boiler are considered pollutants.
gas $/m3
The general specifications of the used fuels are shown in Table 3 and the
equipment prices are given in Table 4. The converter’s inverter (DC to

6
A. Toopshekan et al. Sustainable Cities and Society 87 (2022) 104170

Table 4
Equipment and operation costs.
Item PV Panel Battery Bank Wind turbine Diesel Inverter
generator

Capacity Unit kW kWh kW kW kW

Rated power 1 1 1.5 0–20 1
Life time (years) 20 5 20 15,000 (hours) 15
Investment cost ($/Capacity) 1100 400 1650 428 300
Replacement ($/Capacity) 1100 400 1650 357 300
Maintenance cost ($/Capacity/ 30 4 60 0.02 ($/h) 3
yr.)
Reference (Li, Gao & Ruan, (Tamjid Shabestari et al., (Razmjoo et al., (Sarker, 2016) (Arévalo, Benavides, Lata-garcía & Jurado,
2018) 2022) 2021) 2020)

AC) and rectifier (AC to DC) efficiency are both 95%. Also, the batteries’ Step 7. Obtain the normalized form of the decision matrix:
roundtrip efficiency are 90%.
xij
R = ( ∑m )0.5 (7)
3. Methodology
2
i=1 xij

In the presented study, the proposed system consists of both con­ Step 8. Calculate the weighted normalized matrix:
ventional and renewable resources, a combination that increases reli­ V =R×W (8)
ability, reduces total costs, and leads to a more credible optimization.
Step 9. Determine the positive and negative ideal solutions:
3.1. TOPSIS method ( )
A+ = v + +
1 , …, vm = {(max V| positive criteria), (min V| negative criteria)}

TOPSIS (Technique for Order of Preference by Similarity to Ideal (9)

Solution), is a multi-criteria decision-making approach. It compares ( )
various alternatives, systems, or choices based on different pre-prepared A− = v−1 , …, v−m = {(min V| positive criteria), (max V| negative criteria)}
criteria. The sustainable development goals are proposed as a general (10)
approach in TOPSIS MCDM for weighting economic, technical, envi­
ronmental and energy security criteria. Then, the optimized hybrid en­ Step 10. Estimate the relative distance of each obtained solution
ergy system is investigated by the aforementioned MCDM as a specific from the ideal solution:
case. √̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅
∑m
( )2
The steps for implementing TOPSIS are as follows: +
S = v+ − vij (11)
i=1
Step 1. Specifying the criteria (m) and alternatives (n):
√̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅
i = 1, 2, 3, …m and j = 1, 2, 3, …, n (1) ∑ m
( )2
−
S = v− − vij (12)
The criteria or the objective functions of the optimization algorithm
i=1

can be positive or negative; furthermore, for each of the optimized Step 11. Calculate the closeness coefficient:
scenarios, an alternative is introduced.
S−
Cj = ; 0 ≤ Cj ≤ 1, for j = 1, 2, …, n (13)
Step 2. The related criteria and alternatives evaluation for the decision S − + S+
matrix (X) and the weight matrix (W) must be defined as follows:
{ }
X = xij and W = [wi ] (2)
3.2. SDG weights for TOPSIS
For creating the weight matrix, the following steps are needed based
on the entropy method. The SDGs are the blueprint to access a better and sustainable future
for people. They clarify the important challenges like poverty, climate
Step 3. Define the normalized matrix: change, environmental degradation, inequality, peace, and justice.
xij Fig. 7 indicates the 17 SDGs stated by the United Nations in order of
Nij = ∑m (3)
i=1 xij
importance. Nine of these 17 goals are related to the energy optimiza­
tion problem. Also, there are 4 general categories of objectives including
Step 4. Estimate the k value based on the number of criteria (m): Economic, Social-Environmental, Technical, and Energy Security Ob­
jectives. Table 5 indicates which goal is related to HOMER parameters
1
k= (4) and categories.
lnm
To match the SDGs to the decision-making objectives, the 169 targets
Step 5. Determine the entropy for each alternative: of the 17 main goals must be considered. Each of these targets, which
can be accessed from (https://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/), de­
∑
m
Ej = − k Nij . lnNij (5) scribes the context covered by each of the main goals. If even one target
i=1 mentions a relationship with one of the decision-making objectives
(criteria), the goal (SDG) related to that target enters the weighting
Step 6. Survey the weight matrix: process. The relationships identified with the decision criteria for
(
1 − ej
) remote areas of Iran are summarized in Table 5. Here, two views will
wj = ∑n ( ) (6) arise: first, weighting based on the number of SDGs identified for each
j=1 1 − ej
category, and second, weighting considering the importance of SDGs

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A. Toopshekan et al. Sustainable Cities and Society 87 (2022) 104170

Fig. 7. SDGs achieved by the united nations ().

Table 5
Classification and weighting of parameters (United Nations, 2022).
Category Parameters Main Related SDGs to the Category Equal SDG equal SDG priority
Weights Weights weights

Economic Objectives Cost of Energy (COE) SDG-1 (No Poverty) 1 4 46

Social-Environmental
Objectives
Technical Objectives
Energy Security
Net Present Cost (NPC)
Initial Cost (IC)
Operation cost (OC)
Carbon Dioxide (CO2)
Nitrogen Oxides (NOX)
Sulfur Dioxide (SO2)
Excess Electricity (EXEL)
Excess Thermal (EXTH)
Electrical renewable fraction
(ERF)
Generator heat recovery (HR)
Diversity
Diesel Dependency (DD)
Natural gas dependency (NGD)
SDG − 8 (Economic Growth)
SDG-7 (Affordable and clean energy)
SDG-11 (Sustainable Cities and communities)
SDG-3 (Good Health and Well-being) 1 6 47
SDG-7 (Affordable and Clean Energy)
SDG-11 (Sustainable Cities and communities)
SDG-12 (Responsible consumption and
production)
SDG-13 (Climate Action)
SDG-15 (Life on land)
SDG-7 (Affordable and Clean Energy) 1 3 26
SDG-9 (Energy Infrastructure)
SDG-12 (Responsible consumption and
Production)
SDG-7 (Affordable and clean energy) 1 4 33
SDG-9 (Energy Infrastructure)
SDG-11 (Sustainable Cities and communities)
SDG-12 (Responsible consumption and
Production)

with the lower assigned number. Both of which are considered in this
case study.
It should be noted that in the equal weighting, all 14 parameters have
the same weight. In the SDG equal weighting, each parameter weights as
the number of goals covered regardless of the priority of goals. In the
end, the SDG priority weights column indicates the weight of parameters
due to the priority of goals. The simple method used for scoring the
parameters is as Eq. 14.
∑
n
Parameter′ s score = (18 − SDG number) (14)
i=1

Where n is the number of SDGs that are related to a parameter. This

equation scores the SDGs based on their importance. For example, SDG-
1 achieves 17 points, SDG-3 achieves 15 points, SDG-7 achieves 11
points, and so on. Finally, each parameter weights equal to the sum of
SDG points related to that parameter. Fig. 8. Steps of optimization using HOMER results, SDG weights and TOPSIS
Fig. 8 shows the decision-making process. The first step is collecting multi-criteria decision making.
the related data of electrical load, components’ price, resources, and

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A. Toopshekan et al. Sustainable Cities and Society 87 (2022) 104170

economic data. The second step is inserting data into HOMER software
and achieving the results of different scenarios. The third step is deter­
mining the weights of TOPSIS decision making and the last step is
putting up the considered weights into the TOPSIS model in MATLAB.
3.3. Power producer equations
In the following equations, the mathematical modeling of each
component of the system is described.
• PV power equation
Flat PV panels generate power from solar radiation and their output
depends on the characteristics of PV and the cell temperature. The PV
power equation is shown below (Jahangir et al., 2020):
G
PPV = PPV × fdPV × × [1 + α( Tcell − 25)] (15)
rated
1000
where G is solar radiation (w/m2 ), PPV rated is the PV rated power, fdPV is
the panel derating factor (3% per year), α is the temperature coefficient
of power 0.49 (%/ ◦ C), and Tcell is the cell temperature. Also the overall
efficiency of module is considered to be 15.3%.
Integration of a fuel generator with renewable resources makes the
hybrid system more flexible in the power supply process which leads to a
more affordable stand-alone hybrid system. The selected generic diesel
generator in this study has a 25% heat recovery ratio that can be used as
a CHP unit. The hourly diesel fuel consumption of this generator is
calculated based on the following equation:
FD (t) = A.PR + B.P(t) (20)
where P(t) refers to the generator output power in each time step, FD (t)
denotes the fuel consumption, and PR is the rated power of the gener­
ator. A and B are the constant values equal to 0.08 L/kW and 0.24 L/kW,
respectively (Sawle, Gupta, & Bohre, 2018).
3.4. Economic parameters and objective function definition
The total NPC is the result of a compilation of capital, replacement,
operation, and maintenance costs, and also resource-related costs. Its
value can be calculated from Eq. 21 (Rad et al., 2022).
CNPC =
CA
(21)
CRF(i, LT)

• WT power equation In this equation, CA is the annualized total cost ($/year), and CRF(i, LT) is
the capital recovery factor, which is obtained by Eq. 22 (Razmjoo et al.,
The hourly power output of a WT, at a particular location, depends 2021).
on the air density, windmill area, power coefficient of the wind turbine, i(1 + i)LT
and the hourly wind velocity V (m/s). Eq. 2 shows how the output power CRF(i.LT) = (22)
(1 + i)LT − 1
of the turbine differs based on the power curve.
⎧
⎪ 0 V ≤ Vcutin LT is the project lifetime (year), and i is the annual real interest rate,
⎪
⎪
⎪
⎪ which is obtained by Eq. 23 (Razmjoo et al., 2021).
⎪
⎪
⎨ P rated V3
⋅V 3 − 3 cutin 3 .Prated Vcutin ≤ V ≤ Vrated i∘ − f
(16)
3 3
PWT = Vrated − Vcutin
⎪
Vrated − Vcutin i= (23)
⎪
⎪ 1+f
⎪
⎪ P rated V rated ≤ V ≤ V cutoff
⎪
⎪
⎩
0 V > Vcutoff
i◦ = nominal interest rate (%)
where Vcutin is the cut-in wind speed (m/s), Vcutoff is the cut-off wind f = annual expected inflation rate (%)
speed (m/s), and Vrated is the wind speed (m/s) at which the turbine
generates its rated power (Prated ) (Luta & Raji, 2018). The power curve of Based on the announced rate of the Central Bank of Iran, the discount
this unit is assumed such as a 1.5 kW AWS model wind turbine. rate and the annual inflation rate are considered to be 18% and 16%,
respectively, over 20 years of the project’s lifetime. The COE is the mean
• Boiler equations cost of energy for comparing the cost-effectiveness of systems (Goswami
& Sadhu, 2021). Eq. 24 shows the COE formula (Shahsavari et al., 2022).
In order to respond to a large part of the annual thermal demand, a Cann.t
boiler with 85% efficiency is used. Natural gas, which has about 67% of COE = (24)
Eserved
carbon content, is the fuel used in the boiler. The operation cost of the
boiler is calculated by equation (17) (Poursistani et al., 2014). where Cann.t is the total annualized cost of components, and Eserved is the
consumed energy in one year. Overall renewable fraction of generated
∑
24
[ ]
Cboiler = Pgas .Gasboiler .(365).F (17) power is calculated by Eq. 25.
h=1
Enonren + Hnonren
ORF = 1 − (25)
where Pgas is the energy price of gas ($/kWh), and Gasboiler is calculated Eserved + Hserved
by Eq. 18 (Study, 2014)
where Enonren and Hnonren refer to the nonrenewable fraction of useful
Hboiler generated electrical energy and thermal power, respectively. Also, Eserved
Gasboiler = (18)
ηboiler .HV and Hserved denote the served electrical and thermal annual demands,
respectively. In this study, the generated thermal energy by the CHP unit
where Hboiler is the heat production (kWh), ηboiler is the boiler efficiency, is considered to be renewable power because it prevented natural gas
and HV is the heating value of natural gas. consumption in the boiler. Furthermore, when the thermal-related pa­
Also, F is the boiler Recovery factor (Study, 2014), which is calcu­ rameters are removed from Eq. 11, the electrical renewable fraction or
lated based on i: interest rate and n: boiler operation lifetime. ERF is calculated. Salvage is an effective value on economic calculation
and specifies the value of the components at the end of the project
(1 + i)n − 1
F= (19) lifetime. In HOMER software, the salvage value of a component is
i(1 + i)n
directly related to its leftovers life. It also assumes that the salvage value
appertains to the replacement cost rather than the initial capital cost.
• Diesel Generator HOMER calculates the Salvage value from Eq. 26 (Jahangir et al., 2020).

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A. Toopshekan et al. Sustainable Cities and Society 87 (2022) 104170

( ( ))
Rcomp − Rproj − Rcomp .INT
Rproj
(26)
Rcomp
S = Crep
Rcomp
where Crep is the replacement cost, Rcomp is the component’s lifetime,
Rproj is the project lifetime, and INT is a rounding function for converting
an integer number to a real number.
4. Results and Discussion
This section is divided into the six sub-sections, first, the optimized
configuration and CHP performance are discussed in 4.1 and 4.2,
respectively. Due to the variation in component prices and energy usage,
the economic sensitivity and load sensitivity is analyzed in 4.3 and 4.4
respectively. Also, the grid breakeven distance is analyzed in sub-sec­
tion 4.5 for finding the minimum distance of the off-grid residential
section from the nearest power transmission lines. Finally, the TOPSIS
method is implemented for multi-criteria decision-making in sub-sec­
tion 4.6.
4.1. The optimal size of the systems in HOMER
In this section, technical and financial results of the optimum system
are analyzed. Table 6 shows the characteristics of the optimized hybrid
energy system by the HOMER software. The first and most economic
scenario utilizes all three energy sources, combining six wind turbines (9
kW) with 7.5 kW PV, 10 kW diesel generator, and 21 kWh batteries. The
least economic scenario is one that supplies energy from renewable re­
sources only, with 12 wind turbines (18kW), 33 kW PV, and 119 kWh of
batteries. The high battery capacity for the aforementioned scenario has
naturally resulted in a prominent rise in the COE and NPC, both factors
almost 100% higher than the WT/PV/DG/Battery scenario. As antici­
pated, the PV/DG/Battery scenario is more economic than the WT/DG/
Battery since the PV is currently the most cost-efficient system among
renewable energy systems.
The distribution of electricity and heat generation for the WT/PV/
DG/Battery scenario is demonstrated in Table 7. In colder seasons with
lower electrical demand, the three systems are responsible for roughly
the same share of power production. For the warmer months, which
exhibit a spike in electrical demand due to cooling consumption, diesel
and PV have the highest and lowest share of power production,
respectively. The performance of wind turbines is distinctly improved in
the summer months on account of stronger wind potential. However, PV
electricity production does not increase significantly from winter to
summer despite heightened solar radiation. Therefore, although PV is an
overall better choice compared to wind turbines for the system as a
whole, with high wind speed the turbine becomes a superior option for
generating power.
As shown in Fig. 3, the city of Naein rarely faces sub-zero tempera­
tures throughout the year. Hence, the thermal demand remains rela­
tively unvarying from summer to winter. Approximately 80% of the heat
demand is supplied from the boiler by burning natural gas, the cheaper
fuel, and the rest is supplied from CHP. There is a notable increase in the
share of CHP in heat generation during the summer months, which stems
from the extra usage of the diesel generator and the available recovered
heat during this time. Explicitly, the diesel consumption is increased in
the summer to make up for added demand and some of the extra power
that is produced is diverted towards supplying heat. Contrary to PV and
wind turbine, the low capital cost of the diesel generator has led to the
installation of a 10 kW generator, beyond the need of the 10 households,
to be economic. However, the high price of fuel compared to the low
maintenance on PV and wind turbine means that the system only falls
back on the diesel generator when the demand goes up. In other words,
the additional electrical demand in the summer is not high enough to
warrant the installation of more renewable resources.
The yearly electricity output from PVs, wind turbines, diesel gener­
ators, and discharging batteries for the PV/WT/DG/Battery scenario is
depicted in Fig. 9. The photovoltaics naturally produce power during
daylight hours while the diesel generator and batteries act as compli­
mentary power generators that mostly supply electricity during the
night. As mentioned before, the diesel generator is active more
frequently in June till August, especially in the afternoon when tem­
perature rise causes high cooling demand.
4.2. COE comparison
In this section, a comparison between this paper and other papers has
been done. Table 8 states that researchers have resulted in different
optimal COEs by installing different CHP-based systems. Among these
studies, hydrogen systems, micro gas turbines, diesel generators, and
boilers have been more commonly used to produce heat and power
simultaneously. Choosing COE as an objective function allows a
comprehensive comparison among investigations with different systems
and different sizes. Also, unlike the NPC, the lower COE in one article
simply indicates that the system used in that article is more efficient. The
most important factors affecting the COE are the type of system used to
provide power, the price of components, and the fuel and grid’s elec­
tricity price in the country where the research was conducted. In gen­
eral, grid-connected systems have a lower cost than stand-alone systems.
The use of a fuel cell has led to higher energy costs due to its higher
price. Also, in countries with high fossil fuel prices, such as European
countries, the cost-effectiveness of diesel generators and boilers is lower
than the other countries. The optimal COE in this article is 0.143
($/kWh), which is lower than all the other off-grid systems mentioned in
Table 8.
4.3. CHP performance
The Simultaneous supply of electrical and thermal demand by the
generator promotes less fuel consumption and higher efficiency for the
power system. Table 9 demonstrates the annual power production and
fuel consumption of the diesel generator and the boiler. Also, the fuel
profit of the proposed hybrid renewable energy system as compared
against the pure use of DG for electrical demand and pure use of boiler
for thermal demand is also shown in Table 9. Additionally, the yearly
profile for natural gas and diesel consumption of the PV/WT/DG/Bat­
tery system is shown in Fig. 10(a) and Fig. 10(b), respectively. Hy­
bridizing the system has achieved a 70% profit in comparison to
supplying all electricity from diesel, and a 20% profit compared to
supplying all heat from natural gas. Since natural gas shortage in the

Table. 6
Techno-economic features of the optimized energy system in each configuration.
Case WT PV Converter Battery DG Fuel (L/ Gas (m3/ ORF ERF COE NPC ($)
(unit) (kW) (kW) (kWh) (kW) yr.) yr.) (%) (%) ($/kWh)

PV/WT/DG/Battery/ 6 7.55 10.1 21 10 5995 4351 37.1 59.8 0.143 104,221

Boiler
PV/DG/Battery/Boiler 0 12.5 12.6 23 10 8350 3904 34.9 44.7 0.150 108,679
WT/DG/Battery/Boiler 10 0 9.5 30 10 6835 4272 35.8 53.9 0.163 117,916
DG/Battery/Boiler 0 0 12.5 50 10 13,585 3023 24.9 0 0.207 148,271
WT/PV/Battery/Boiler 12 33.2 22.2 119 0 0 5457 47.3 100 0.301 212,259

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A. Toopshekan et al.
Table. 7
Share of each power generation equipment in the monthly power supply process.
Power Power Production Profile
Electrical
Thermal
Fig. 9. Annual power output profile of each component in the proposed hybrid energy system.
winter is a rather common occurrence, a hybrid system also provides
better reliability. Another observation from the table is that the diesel
generator’s total power production per year is 80% of the power pro­
duction from natural gas. However, fuel consumption and fuel cost for
natural gas have decreased by 27.5% and 81% compared to the diesel
generator, respectively.
The profiles of power production, electrical demand, and thermal
demand of the PV/WT/DG for a typical week in summer are displayed in
Fig. 11. PV production has a figuratively repetitive pattern while the
more random nature of wind potential means no unique pattern can be
distinguished regarding electricity production from the wind turbine.
The excess electricity is mostly produced at times of high power gen­
eration from the wind turbines. Therefore, the capacity of PVs is suitable
in terms of excess electricity as most of the electricity production of PVs
is consumed immediately instead of being stored for later use. As seen in
Fig. 9, the power production of the diesel generator coincides with high
electrical demand and low PV production. Since the diesel generator
generates both heat and electricity, high electricity production from the
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Sustainable Cities and Society 87 (2022) 104170
diesel generator also means that boiler production can be lowered.
However, as seen in Fig. 9, there are times when diesel heat generation
exceeds thermal demand. Therefore, the operation of the diesel gener­
ator is primarily dependent on electrical demand and thus results in
waste heat at times, which could be considered a weakness in an optimal
system.
4.4. Economic sensitivity analysis
The sensitivity analysis is important for finding the robustness of the
optimal system. Different PV, WT, and DG prices affect the optimum cost
of energy. Table 10 shows different price ranges for these components.
This price difference can increase the NPC of the system and make the
system non-optimal. Therefore, it is necessary to determine what price
thresholds for the PV, WT, and DG will significantly increase the cost of
energy.
By considering other studies in the field of hybrid energy power
supply, the cost range of 600 to 2800 $/kW for PV, 600 to 3200 $/kW for
A. Toopshekan et al. Sustainable Cities and Society 87 (2022) 104170

Table. 8
Comparison of cost of energy in CHP based hybrid energy systems.
Reference Year System Location LCOE Description
($/kWh)

(Shahsavari et al., 2022 PV- WT- Diesel generator- Battery- Boiler Iran 0.236 Off-grid rural electrical, thermal, and desalination demands supplied
2022) with single-objective HOMER optimization.
(Ji, Liang, Xie, Huang 2020 PV- Bio generator -Diesel generator- China 0.275 Stand-alone power supply to a rural village by a mixed-integer linear
& Wang, 2021) Battery-Boiler programming optimization in MATLAB.
(Assaf & Shabani, 2019 PV – Electrolyzer – hydrogen tank – Fuel Australia 0.340 Supplying an off-grid load, using MATLAB-based genetic algorithm by
2019) cell – Solar Collector hybridizing PV and fuel cell.
(Effatnejad et al., 2018 PV – WT – Natural Gas Engine and Iran 0.238 Off-grid Supplying 800 bed Hospital with 2254 kW peak load and 2851
2018) Hydrogen Gas Engine – Battery – peak heat. Analyzing with HOMER software.
Electrolyzer – reformer – Boiler
(Roshandel, Golzar & 2018 SOFC system Iran 0.172 Grid-connected Supplying heat and power to a greenhouse by Solid
Astaneh, 2018) SOFC system with a micro gas turbine 0.154 Oxide Fuel Cell and different kinds of the turbine. Analyzing with
SOFC system with a steam turbine 0.096 genetic algorithm.
SOFC system with a steam injection gas 0.085
turbine
(Sagani et al., 2017) 2017 PV – WT – Diesel Generator – Battery Greece 0.517 Off-grid power generation to Meet the household demand with
sustainable power systems by using HOMER software.
(Das & Al-Abdeli, 2017 PV – Battery – Internal Combustion Engine Australia 0.210 Using GA to find the best case of coupling a combustion-based prime
2017) – Micro Gas Turbine mover with PV array. The electrical and thermal mean load was 29 and
18 kW for this stand-alone system Respectively.
(Xu, Nthontho & 2016 PV – WT – DG – Battery – Boiler South 0.540 Compared the off-grid electrification strategies for rural areas
Chowdhury, 2016) Africa
(Castellanos et al., 2015 PV – Battery – Boiler – Anaerobic digestion India 0.289 Off-grid power supply 22 MWh per year load demand for a rural village.
2015) tank – Micro Turbine Using HOMER software.

Table. 9
Performance of generator and boiler in the proposed hybrid energy system.
Device Electrical production Thermal production Annual fuel Annual fuel Needed fuel for pure Achieved annual fuel profit by the
(kWh/yr.) (kWh/yr.) consumption cost ($) DG /Boiler hybrid system

Diesel generator 19,033 (40.2%) 9990 (21.5%) 5995 L 1200 20,407 70.6%
(CHP)
Natural Gas – 36,525 (78.5%) 4351 m3 218 5457 20%
Boiler

Fig. 10. a) Annual fuel consumption profile of natural gas boiler; b) Annual fuel consumption profile of diesel generator.

WT, and 177 to 700 $/kW for DG is selected for sensitivity analysis. In
the present study, the HOMER surface plot sensitivity analysis tool is
used for determining the variation of COE in each initial cost range of
the component. The effect of PV and DG capital costs on the COE of the
PV/WT/DG hybrid system is shown in Fig. 12 (a). The constant COE
lines of the graph are close to being vertical, meaning the COE is more
sensitive to the capital cost of PV than it is to DG capital cost. For
example, if the starting point is considered 170 $ for DG and 600 $ for
PV, multiplying the cost of DG four times only increases COE by about
8%. However, the same increase in PV capital cost raises the COE more
than 17%. The effect of PV and WT capital cost on COE is shown in
Fig. 12 (b) and the effect of WT and DG capital cost on COE is shown in
Fig. 12 (c). DG capital cost clearly has the weakest impact on COE while
the effect of the initial cost for PV and WT on COE is almost equal. It is
also concluded from Figs. 12. (a-c) that even by increasing components
capital cost by more than 200%, the rise of COE would still be less than
60%. Fig. 12(d) demonstrates how diesel fuel price and battery cost
influence the COE. With low fuel prices, the battery becomes redundant
and therefore the COE remains more or less constant by increasing
battery cost. As shown in the figure, the effect of battery cost on the COE
becomes more noticeable as the fuel price rises.
A decisive factor in the performance of a renewable hybrid system is
resource potential. Fig. 13(a) demonstrates how average wind speed and
solar radiation affect the NPC of the PV/WT/DG plant. While low
resource determinedly causes heightened NPC and reduces probability,
the sensitivity is lower for radiations higher than 6 kWh/m2.day and
wind speed greater than 8 m/s; indicating that the PV and wind turbine
have reached maximum efficiency. The sensitivity of yearly CO2 emis­
sions against boiler efficiency and the heat recovery ratio of the diesel
generator is shown in Fig. 13(b). Boiler efficiency is imperative in
reducing emissions, but increasing the DG heat recovery ratio only
brings a slight change in emissions. The lack of remarkable emission
sensitivity to the DG heat recovery ratio is due to the lower share of CHP
in supplying heat.

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Fig. 11. Power generation profile of a typical week for supplying thermal and electrical demands.

consumption is constant, a change in the power consumption profile

Table. 10
leads to a change in the peak of demand. Accordingly, the peak of
Maximum and minimum prices for the main power components in the hybrid
electrical & thermal demand in residential, commercial, and industrial
energy system.
usages are 26.7 & 14.8 kW, 18.8 & 21.1 kW, and 9.9 & 10.9 kW,
Category Reference Initial cost Replacement cost O&M cost respectively. Table 11 indicates the techno-economic characteristics of
($/kW) ($/kW)
the optimized hybrid energy system in different types of load.
Min PV (Tribioli & 600 600 5 $/kW/ According to Table 11, both the commercial and industrial systems
capital Cozzolino, 2019) yr.
are more economic when compared to the residential PV/WT/DG plant.
cost
Max PV (Amrollahi & 2800 2800 10 $/kW/ The commercial unit has the advantage of peak demand coinciding with
capital Bathaee, 2017) yr. midday when PV production is at its height. Therefore, the capacity of
cost PVs is raised for this unit while fewer wind turbines and batteries in
Min WT (Alsharif, Nordin 600 600 50 $/kW/ addition to a smaller diesel generator are used. The COE for the com­
capital & Ismail, 2016) yr.
cost
mercial unit has dropped 12.5% compared to the residential plant. As for
Max WT (Sawle et al., 3200 3000 80 $/kW/ the industrial unit, the steady demand profile has led to a dramatic
capital 2018) yr. decrease in the number of needed batteries, lowering costs. While the
cost capacity of PV and diesel generator has also decreased in comparison to
Min DG (Kusakana, 2014) 177 177 0.05
the residential and commercial units, the number of wind turbines has
capital $/kW/
cost hour remained the same as the residential unit. The COE of the industrial unit
Max DG (Islam, Akhter & 700 700 0.5 has decreased by 14% compared to the COE of the residential plant.
capital Rahman, 2018) $/kW/ Considering how all three units have the same daily demand, the results
cost hour further emphasize the positive impact of load uniformity on both system
performance and cost.
4.5. Load sensitivity analysis A comparison of the thermal demand profile and heat production
from boiler and CHP for the residential, commercial, and industrial units
In order to show the impact of different loads on the optimal system, is depicted in Fig. 16. The commercial unit has the best performance
two other types of loads are considered. By considering different loads, it with the least amount of wasted heat generated throughout the week.
can be seen that the results are only optimum for a certain load profile or The heat production also rarely surpasses thermal demand for the in­
not. Commercial and industrial loads are considered for obtaining the dustrial unit, which requires a steady supply of both heat and electricity
optimal size of the system in this section. To determine the effect of the during the night. Therefore, once again the residential unit has the least
shape of the load annual average of this simulated load is 112.7 kWh/ desirable output as compared to the other two presumed systems.
d for electrical demand and 122.5 kWh/d for thermal demand, exactly
like residential demand. Fig. 14 and Fig. 15 show the seasonal electrical 4.6. Grid breakeven distance
and thermal power consumption profiles in different usages, respec­
tively. Unlike residential demand, the peak of the commercial load is at The grid breakeven distance is the minimum distance of the nearest
midday, between 8 AM and 5 PM. In addition, considering the 24-hour power transmission lines from a residential section that the hybrid
consumption of industrial units and having a relatively constant amount system is still optimal. Any distance less than the breakeven distance
of energy requirement during one day, the demand profile is without leads to the choice of expanding the national grid in the off-grid area.
severe alternation or high peak. As can be seen, although the daily This crucial parameter depends on electricity production and the grid

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Fig. 12. Heat map of COE sensitivity to the initial prices: a) DG Vs. PV capital cost; b) WT vs. PV capital cost c) WT vs. DG capital cost; and d) Diesel fuel vs.
battery cost.

Fig. 13. a) Sensitivity analysis of NPC based on annual average renewable resources (with COE midpoints); b) Sensitivity analysis of annual CO2 emission based on
DG and boiler performance.

distribution cost, meteorological data, and the components’ cost of the changes from PV/WT/DG/Battery to DG/Grid. For the assumed grid cost
off-grid hybrid system. To this end, the HOMER optimization module is range, any distance less than 2.8 km would mean that the hybrid
applied and the results are shown in Fig. 17. The borderline between the renewable system is not cost-efficient, while for distances further than
two colors shows the limit that the optimal system configuration, 6.4 km the PV/WT/DG/Battery is the more proficient choice. The

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A. Toopshekan et al. Sustainable Cities and Society 87 (2022) 104170

Fig. 14. Seasonal electrical demand in different loads: a) Residential; b) Commercial; and c) Industrial.

Fig. 15. Seasonal thermal demand in different loads: a) Residential; b) Commercial; and c) Industrial.

Table. 11
Techno-economic optimizations of the hybrid-CHP system based on different power consumption profiles.
Load WT (unit) PV (kW) Converter (kW) Battery (kWh) DG (kW) Fuel (L/yr.) Gas (m3/yr.) ORF (%) ERF (%) COE ($/kWh) NPC ($)

Residential 6 7.55 10.1 21 10 5995 4351 37.1 59.8 0.143 104,221

Commercial 4 14.70 11.6 16 8 4211 4689 42.5 72.9 0.125 91,644
Industrial 6 5.35 5.7 8 6 6780 4099 38.5 53.8 0.123 90,568

relationship between grid cost and system type is not linear, meaning extension distance is shown in Fig. 18(a). The DG/Grid/Battery is only
that as transmission costs become more expensive, the hybrid solution applicable for a small range of electrical loads and the off-grid DG/WT/
becomes economically viable for a wider range of distances. PV is only suitable for demands less than 190 kWh/day. Extension dis­
The optimum system based-on electrical load consumption and grid tance directly affects the most favorable choice but as the electrical

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Fig. 16. Comparison of thermal demand supply process by the optimal configuration .

option. Another analysis is also performed to evaluate how diesel price

Fig. 17. Power grid breakeven distance analysis based on various grid capi­
tal costs.
demand increase, extension distance becomes inconsequential to the
choice of the optimum system. For any load demand higher than 240
kWh/day, the on-grid DG/PV/WT/Battery is the most advantageous
could change the optimum system which the result is shown in Fig. 18
(b). It is observed that the diesel fuel price has a perfectly linear asso­
ciation with extension distance, suggesting that both factors are of the
same importance when choosing an optimal configuration.
Emissions of carbon dioxide and other harmful pollutants have
become one of the most important features of any power production
system. Fig .19 shows how different system configurations vary in terms
of CO2, SO2, and NOx emissions. The pure DG/pure boiler produces the
highest amount of emissions. Although NOx emissions of the pure grid/
pure boiler are rather similar to the hybrid configurations, the CO2
emissions are almost 56% higher. Therefore, it is not possible to
meaningfully reduce NOx emissions without finding alternative solu­
tions for supplying thermal demand. The difference between a CHP
hybrid and a non-CHP hybrid system’s emissions is not significant since
renewables aren’t used directly for generating heat, but the CHP hybrid
system has a definitive advantage when comparing overall performance
in regards to greenhouse gas emissions.

Fig. 18. Sensitivity analysis of the optimal hybrid system configuration: a) Grid extension distance vs. Average electrical load; b) Grid extension distance vs. Diesel
fuel price.

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A. Toopshekan et al. Sustainable Cities and Society 87 (2022) 104170

renewable systems perform better in connection with extra electricity

and renewable fraction, but are less effective when it comes to curbing
excess thermal energy as they only use a single technology, boiler, for
supplying heat.
Table 13 indicates the overall TOPSIS performance score of systems
based on three weighting methods explained in sub-section 3.3. In the
equal weighting method, the PV/WT/DG/Boiler/Battery (BAT) system
has the best performance but when the SDGs are considered, the PV/
WT/BAT/Boiler has the best performance. In essence, paying attention
to SDGs eliminates the DG from the final result and encourages the
maximum use of renewable energy despite the high price of renewables
compared to fossil fuels. Another interesting point is that although the
PV/WT/DG/BAT/Boiler configuration is still the best choice when all
the objectives are given equal weight, it is followed immediately by the
Fig. 19. Comparison of SO2, NOx, and CO2 emissions in different scenarios. PV/WT/BAT/Boiler, indicating that even without SDG priority weigh­
ing, this configuration is an overall advantageous option.
4.7. TOPSIS results Fig. 20 shows the performance scores bar chart. The lowest scored
system throughout all three weighing methods is the DG/BAT/Boiler,
The results obtained via HOMER are based on cost optimization the fourth choice by HOMER, followed by PV/DG/BAT/Boiler, the
method, which is arguably the best single-objective method for deter­ second choice by HOMER, when comparing overall score of all three
mining the optimum structure of a hybrid renewable system. However, columns. This demonstrates that cost optimization, albeit a very strong
the downside here is that other system features, such as renewable method for picking the best configuration, could potentially be
fraction, can only be controlled by constraints, but cannot be optimized misleading when it comes to ranking different systems if other important
along with costs. TOPIS offers a simple way of fixing this deficiency by factors in today’s energy sector such as environmental features are
allowing us to not only set multiple criterions for choosing the optimum overlooked. In conclusion, TOPSIS offers a more holistic view of each
system, but also giving different weights to each objective. After scenario’s upsides and downsides, letting users make a more informed
analyzing different economic, technical, and environmental aspects of decisions based on the needs of their systems.
HOMER results and knowing the importance of each criterion, the multi-
criteria decision-making can be done. Four categories are considered for 5. Conclusion
criteria classification and Each category contains various criteria as
stated in Table 12. The evaluations of alternatives are determined based The current study focuses on investigating a hybrid renewable en­
on HOMER results. These numbers will be inserted into the TOPSIS ergy solution for supplying combined heat and power to rural societies
implementation in MATLAB as X (decision matrix). It should be noted with the outstanding climate of West Asia as a less noticed kind of en­
that the last column determines the positive or negative effects of ergy system. As a key factor the potential of HOMER software to be
criteria on the alternatives optimality.
According to Table 12, any configuration containing a diesel
Table 13
generator is producing 2 to 3 times the emission of those without it,
Systems’ performance score in the TOPSIS method.
making these systems less desirable when it comes to the environmental
category, which is the highest-weighted SDG criteria (47 for priority System Equal SDG with SDG with equal
weights priority weights
weighing and 6 for equal weighing),. The economic factors, the second
criteria in terms of weight (46 and 4), naturally yield the same results as PV/WT/DG/BAT/ 0.64495 0.65535 0.62263
Boiler
HOMER’s cost optimization. As for energy security, third with regards to
PV/DG/BAT/Boiler 0.57735 0.56632 0.51781
weight (33 and 4), the systems without diesel are again better in relation WT/DG/BAT/Boiler 0.57488 0.59453 0.55829
to diesel dependency, but then need more natural gas as a result, leading DG/BAT/Boiler 0.4242 0.39832 0.34546
to a lower NGD score. The most diverse system is the same as the PV/WT/BAT/Boiler 0.62584 0.67243 0.70703
HOMER optimum, utilizing all five technologies. The last category is PV/BAT/Boiler 0.58293 0.61946 0.66499
WT/BAT/Boiler 0.5576 0.57212 0.63245
technical with the lowest weights (26 and 3), where the completely

Table 12
TOPSIS evaluation matrix of alternatives and criteria.
Homer Priority 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Category PV/WT/ DG/BAT PV/DG /BAT/ WT/DG/ BAT/ DG/BAT PV/WT/ BAT/ PV/BAT WT/BAT/ Desirable
/Boiler Boiler Boiler /Boiler Boiler /Boiler Boiler Trend

Economic COE 0.143 0.15 0.163 0.207 0.301 0.36 0.445 negative
NPC 104,221 108,679 117,916 148,271 212,259 253,661 312,735 negative
IC 38,433 30,971 43,295 28,043 119,612 145,773 183,528 negative
OC 3917 4627 4443 7158 5516 6424 7693 negative
Environmental CO2 24,148 29,460 26,177 41,424 10,581 10,581 10,581 negative
NOX 100 136 113 214 10.3 10.3 10.3 negative
SO2 38.5 53.6 43.8 87.1 0 0 0 negative
Technical EX th 1.55 1.87 3.12 5.09 0 0 0 negative
EX el 9.85 10.4 9.74 0 50.4 67 63 negative
ERF 59.8 44.7 53.9 0 100 100 100 positive
HR 21.5 29.8 24.1 47.3 0 0 0 positive
Energy DD 6002 8364 6835 13,585 0 0 0 negative
Security NGD 4351 3902 4272 3023 5457 5457 5457 negative
Diversity 5 4 4 3 4 3 3 positive

17
A. Toopshekan et al.
Fig. 20. The alternatives performance score in the TOPSIS model.
improved by MCDM methods are analyzed. For the first time a SDG-17
based criteria weighting method were developed to minimizing human
intervention in the direct determination of weights. Then the result of
economic optimization by HOMER software is compared with the results
of integrated HOMER/TOPSIS to determine the effect of considering
sustainable development goals on the HRES optimization. The sensi­
tivity analysis and global SDG-based methodology ensure the results are
not inclusive of the present case study, but can also be adapted for other
similar circumstances.
• From the economic point of view, the optimum hybrid plant includes
6 × 1.5 kW wind turbines, 7.5 kW PV, a 10-kW diesel generator, and
21 kWh batteries with a COE of 0.143 $/kWh can be an affordable
option for any mini-rural region located further than 6.4 km from
grid transmission lines.
• Compared to a pure-diesel strategy for electricity production and a
pure-boiler strategy for heat production, the CHP hybrid system
raises emission profits by 70% and 20%, respectively.
• The sensitivity analysis with the COE range of 0.120 to 0.260 $/kWh
against possible variations shows the affordability of the proposed
unit in tropical climates such as that of west Asia.
• Due to the direct/indirect existence of energy systems decision-
making criteria in most UN sustainable development goals, weight­
ing the criteria based on SDG-17 can create a fixed criterion ac­
cording to the conditions of the study area to weight the criteria.
• By considering all SDG-17 objectives compared to only economic
objectives, the COE increased by about 0.15 $/kWh while more than
a 56.6% reduction in emissions and less dependency on fossil fuels
were obtained.
Therefore, the results showed that moving toward SDGs minimizes
fossil fuel consumption and encourages the maximum use of renewable
energy. For future works, it is suggested that the results of the proposed
SDG-based criteria weighting method be compared with other weighting
methods such as AHP, SIMOS, or SMART. Furthermore, a comprehen­
sive review article regarding the relationship between energy systems
decision-making criteria and sustainable development goals is needed to
extend the applicability of the proposed method to other parts of the
world. Accurate detection of the effectiveness of each energy-related
criteria in achieving UN sustainable development goals can overcome
the main limitation of weight determination of decision-making criteria.
Declaration of Competing Interest
None.
Data availability
Data will be made available on request.
18
Sustainable Cities and Society 87 (2022) 104170
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