Scientists have developed a new method to determine which hills of coal waste are suitable for the construction of a tanning factory. Their technology integrates GIS and the technology for order preference due to similarity to an ideal solution. They tested the new approach of Yangquan City, China.
A group of researchers from China has developed a site selection strategy for PV factories in Coal Gangue Hills.
Gangue hills are piles consisting of coal gangue, a waste product of coal extraction that contributes to ecological relegation, environmental pollution and socio-economic issues. In order to investigate the potential of setting up PV plants on it, the team has combined geographical information systems (GIS) data with the technology for order preference due to similarity to an ideal solution (topsis).
“This study takes the urban, mining and suburbs of the city of Yangquan, the province of Shanxi, China, as an example. It assumes the top sis evaluation model and GIS technology to build an evaluation model for the PV plants in Gangue Hills,” the team explained. “The TOPSIS model has the benefits of objectivity, flexibility, ease of use, broad applicability and high reliability. By integrating GIS data analysis and statistics, the model offers a realistic and extensive evaluation process to identify suitable areas for PV construction in Gangue Hills.”
Topsis is a commonly used evaluation method. In the case of Gangue Hills, the team used two important influencing indicators that are known as efficiency indicators and environment indicators. The efficiency indicators include 13 indicators on the second level, grouped in three decision strokes (economic indicators, transport needs and geographical needs). The environmental indicators include six secondary indicators, grouped in two decision strokes (natural environment and living environment).
With the help of the analytical hierarchy process (AHP), the group gave different weights to each indicator. “Through questionnaires, experts are asked to give the importance of each criterion level in relation to the previous target level. The calculation rules are then used to calculate the weight of each indicator in relation to the overall target level, ie obtaining the evaluation values of each evaluation object and the benefit of the insert.
Based on their calculations, efficiency indicators weigh 92.05%, while the environmental weights have 7.95%. Geographical needs have a total weight of 55.57%, economic needs have 24.33%and transport needs account for 12.15%. On the environmental indicators, the natural environment accounts for 3.36%and the human living environment accounts for 4.59%. The single heaviest secondary indicator is solar radiation with 22.67%, and the lightest is the distance to rivers with 0.66%.
Inserting the different GIS data into the model produced five different fitness levels of the local Gangu hills, from “not suitable” to “very high suitability”. Eight hills were identified for the last, while six extra hills were identified for the secondary level of ‘high suitability’. Four hills were identified as ‘not suitable’, eight as ‘low suitability’ and 11 as ‘average suitability’.
“The research takes a thorough account of the unique environmental characteristics of Gangue hills and offers new theoretical insights and practical paths for the use of photovoltaic systems in mines of wastelies,” the academics concluded. “This approach not only deals with the challenges of ecological recovery in mine areas, but also offers a sustainable solution for the development of renewable energy, which determines a new paradigm for the synergy use of abandoned Mijnland and photovoltaic technologies.”
The new method appeared in “Site selection strategy for photovoltaic power plants Construction in Gangue hills: an integrated method based on GIS and AHP topsis“Published in Energy strategy reviews. Researchers from the China University of Mining and Technology (Beijing) and the Beijing Normal University conducted the study.
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