Determination of Effective Criteria for Power Plants Site Selection

Nowadays, location surveys are very common in industrial development for all power plants. In these studies, different criteria are taken into account to select the best place to build a power plant. In the present research, in the first stage, a variety of power plants and their mode of operation were investigated. Then, in the next step, the effective parameters in the activity of the power plant, its location and its performance were determined and divided into three categories of environmental, technical, socio-economic and environmental constraints. In general, all criteria and sub-criteria were expressed in relation to the location of different types of power plants (heater, gas, combined cycle, nuclear, hydroelectric, pumped storage, waves, tidal, wind, solar, geothermal, biomass, diesel and magneto-hydrodynamics). Finally, by specifying such criteria as: energy source of power plants, usability and availability of resources, costs, desirable or unfavorable effects on the human environment, and power generation capabilities, a summary of the characteristics of a power plant was identified.