Sustainability measurement of combined cycle power plants: a novel fuzzy network data envelopment analysis model

In recent years, many companies face economic, environmental, and social problems. Iranian Combined Cycle Power Plants (ICCPPs) consist of three stages with different types of inputs and outputs and complex connections with series and parallel structures. This study proposes a novel non-radial fuzzy network data envelopment analysis (FNDEA) model for assessing the sustainability of ICCPPs' components in a fuzzy context. The new model is based on the range adjusted measure (RAM) model as it can handle both the desirable and undesirable outputs and has several properties such as translation invariant, unit invariant, and projection. The proposed model can simultaneously evaluate the sustainability of the ICCPPs, operational performance, and environmental performance in a unified model. The results reveal that 46% of ICCPPs have a relatively good performance in terms of operational and environmental performance. Also, the results of the correlation coefficient among different types of efficiency scores reveal that environmental efficiency has the most impact on the overall efficiency of ICCPPs. Finally, we suggest a way to improve the sustainability of ICCPPs.

Automated summary

This study proposes a novel non-radial fuzzy network data envelopment analysis (FNDEA) model for assessing the sustainability of Iranian Combined Cycle Power Plants (ICCPPs) in a fuzzy context. The proposed model can simultaneously evaluate the sustainability, operational performance, and environmental performance of ICCPPs. The results reveal that 46% of ICCPPs have a relatively good performance in terms of operational and environmental performance. Furthermore, the correlation coefficient among different types of efficiency scores highlights the significant impact of environmental efficiency on the overall efficiency of ICCPPs. Finally, suggestions to improve the sustainability of ICCPPs are provided.