A Novel Multi-criteria Approach Supporting Strong Sustainability Assessment

Evaluation of decision-making problems in the field of sustainable development, which includes sustainable management of renewable energy sources, requires consideration of multiple aspects and a strong sustainability paradigm. Multi-criteria decision analysis (MCDA) methods are suitable for evaluation in relation to multiple criteria, but the large majority of them are compensatory methods such as TOPSIS (Technique for Order of Preference by Similarity to Ideal Solution), AHP (Analytical Hierarchy Process), and VIKOR (VlseKriterijumska Optimizacija I Kompromisno Resenje). The purpose of this paper is to present the newly developed SSP-VIKOR (Strong Sustainability Paradigm-based VlseKriterijumska Optimizacija I Kompromisno Resenje) method based on the classic VIKOR method but including the possibility of modeling the reduction of linear compensation of criteria. The application of the proposed method is presented for the practical problem of assessing the achievement of SDG 7 (Sustainable Development Goal 7) targets by selected European countries. Benchmarking was also carried out with the SPOTIS (Stable Preference Ordering Towards Ideal Solution) reference method extended with the possibility of compensation reduction to confirm the reliability of the results. Outcomes confirm the usefulness of the SSP-VIKOR method in multi-criteria decision-making problems of sustainable development and the reliability of the provided results.