Page 150 - Biofuels for a More Sustainable Future

136 Biofuels for a More Sustainable Future

However, even accounting for the problem of uncertainty, sustainability is
often characterized by the existence of so-called wicked problems (Rittel
and Webber, 1973; Peterson, 2009; Azapagic and Perdan, 2014): that is,
broadly speaking, that they have ill-defined goals or end points, cannot
be reduced to “true-or-false” or “right-or-wrong” status, are defined
according to the values of different stakeholders, have a very large number
of potential solutions, and are fraught with contradictory or incomplete
information. These challenges might leave those wishing to make informed
decisions at risk of so-called analysis paralysis: the failure to complete their
assessment and make a final decision due to overwhelming complexity.
Without some form of robust decision analysis, policy decisions that could
be critically important might be avoided, stalled, or replaced with subopti-
mal solutions that disregard the available information.
One solution to this problem is multicriteria decision analysis (MCDA), also
referredtoasmulticriteriadecision-making.Asageneralconcept,MCDAaims
to support complex decision-making situations with multiple, potentially con-
flicting objectives which are ascribed differing value by different stakeholders.
The field consists of many different schools of thought and techniques, with
intensedebatebetweenthosedifferentschools.However,regardlessofthespe-
cific methodology chosen, the overarching aims of MCDA are to
• provide a structured, numerical and transparent way of aiding decision-
making
• increase understanding of the decision-maker’s values and those of others,
as well as providing insight into how those values affect the decision
• provide insight into the most influential parameters of the decision, poten-
tially leading to targets or critical trigger points.
MCDA is a very broad field with a variety of methodological approaches,
the extent of which is too great to be encompassed here. For such purposes,
readers are directed to dedicated publications (such as Azapagic and Perdan,
2005a,b; Department for Communities and Local Government, 2009;
Cinelli et al., 2014).

3 Application of life cycle sustainability assessment:
Illustrative case studies

The following sections demonstrate the application of LCSA via two illus-
trative case studies. In both cases, multiple sustainability indicators are used
to provide information for decision makers in the energy sector.