Dam Location Selection in the Basin of Nestos River Using Multicriteria Analysis

Abstract

Main goal of the project was the study and management of water resources as well as the application of multicriteria analysis in selecting the best location for the construction of a dam in the basin of Nestos river. Nestos river is considered to be one of the largest rivers in Greece, with significant environmental value. The best position for building a dam was examined by applying the methods of Saaty, Compromise programming and the method of Entropy weights. Although multicriteria decision analysis is not a fully objective process, its importance is undeniable. The analysis in this project is treated as an optimization problem of f = (f1,f2,...fm), where fi (i = 1,2,...m) is the set of possible alternative solutions (in the specific problem the set of possible positions of dams), xj,(j = 1,2,...n) is the set of the various criteria and fi(xj), (i = 1,2,...m, j = 1,2,...n) is a crisp value indicating the performance rating of each alternative fi. Criteria importance wj (j = 1,2,...m) is a reflection of the Decision Maker's (DM) subjective preference as well as the objective characteristics of the criteria themselves. In the case under study, seven possible locations for dam construction were selected for evaluation. For these positions an analysis was carried out using all methods mentioned before in order to rank each dam. The results of these methods are presented and compared.