Energy challenges for Turkey: Identifying sustainable options for future electricity generation up to 2050

This paper presents for the first time a life cycle environmental, economic and social sustainability assessment of future electricity scenarios for Turkey up to 2050. Fourteen scenarios have been developed and assessed for 19 sustainability indicators, using multi-criteria decision analysis (MCDA) to help identify the most sustainable scenarios. The fossil fuel dominated scenarios are environmentally the least sustainable for seven out of 11 impacts, including the global warming potential (GWP) which increases up to four times on today's impact. Opting for renewable-intensive pathways would halve the current GWP and reduce the use of fossil fuels by three times; however, the depletion of elements would increase 70-fold and investment costs 10-fold. MCDA shows that renewable and nuclear intensive scenarios outperform those dominated by fossil fuels, except for the very high preference for the economic criteria. However, their poor environmental and social performances make them least sustainable overall. The renewable-nuclear intensive scenarios are the most sustainable options with respect to most of the environmental, economic and social impacts considered. Reducing the share of fossil fuels in the electricity mix would not only reduce significantly the environmental impacts, but also the costs, injuries and fatalities, while also improving energy security.