Portland General Electric (PGE): Clean Power Generation Wind Project in Biglow Canyon & Boardman Coal Plant

This article consists of presentation slides on the following subject. This study looks at technology assessment regarding clean power generation for a Northwest utility company. Two types of technology assessments are considered: , one is for a renewable energy source (wind) and the other is for a traditional, fossil-fuel based energy source (coal). Both possess unique, non-overlapping criteria and issues that are considered in the technology selection. Both are part of the company´s energy portfolio. AHP is used to assess the feasibility of both the wind energy and clean burning coal energy technologies. AHP is a decision-making tool in which criteria is ranked and weighted so that a best choice or choices are determined based upon what is deemed to be most important to the decision makers. From this method we determined what method to choose regarding cleaning SO2 emissions for the Boardman plant, and which wind turbine to select for the Biglow Canyon wind farm. Criteria were chosen that represented each technology´s location, cost, feasibility, and availability. For the wind energy, cost was determined to be the most important criterion when making a technology decision. For the SO2 emissions technology, the regenerative process was determined to be the best technology to scrub SO2 emissions from the air. The AHP process can be adjusted to use any criteria and is a useful tool when used alone or with other technology assessment tools. AHP was the only decision-making tool used in this paper´s technology assessment.