IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/plo/pclm00/0000560.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Human-in-the-loop MGA to generate energy system design options matching stakeholder needs

Author

Listed:
  • Francesco Lombardi
  • Stefan Pfenninger

Abstract

The common use of cost minimisation to support energy system design decisions hides from view many economically comparable design options that stakeholders may prefer. Modelling to generate alternatives (MGA) is increasingly popular as a way to go beyond least-cost designs, providing stakeholders with diverse portfolios to appraise. However, generating all the feasible designs is not computationally viable; modellers must choose what design features to generate diversity around, despite not knowing which trade-offs matter the most in practice. Therefore, MGA alone cannot ensure the generation of design options that match stakeholder needs. To address this shortcoming, we propose a human-in-the-loop (HITL) approach that automatically integrates stakeholder preferences into MGA. We elicit preferences by letting stakeholders interact with a tentative MGA design space. Hence, we decode those preferences to feed them back to the MGA algorithm and perform a guided search. This search produces a human-trained design space with more designs that mirror the elicited preferences. A synthetic experiment for the Portuguese energy system shows that HITL-MGA may facilitate consensus formation, promising to accelerate technically and socially feasible energy transition decisions.

Suggested Citation

  • Francesco Lombardi & Stefan Pfenninger, 2025. "Human-in-the-loop MGA to generate energy system design options matching stakeholder needs," PLOS Climate, Public Library of Science, vol. 4(2), pages 1-19, February.
  • Handle: RePEc:plo:pclm00:0000560
    DOI: 10.1371/journal.pclm.0000560
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.plos.org/climate/article?id=10.1371/journal.pclm.0000560
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://journals.plos.org/climate/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pclm.0000560&type=printable
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1371/journal.pclm.0000560?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Pedersen, Tim T. & Victoria, Marta & Rasmussen, Morten G. & Andresen, Gorm B., 2021. "Modeling all alternative solutions for highly renewable energy systems," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 234(C).
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Leonard Goke & Jens Weibezahn & Christian von Hirschhausen, 2021. "A collective blueprint, not a crystal ball: How expectations and participation shape long-term energy scenarios," Papers 2112.04821, arXiv.org, revised Dec 2022.
    2. Knuepfer, K. & Rogalski, N. & Knuepfer, A. & Esteban, M. & Shibayama, T., 2022. "A reliable energy system for Japan with merit order dispatch, high variable renewable share and no nuclear power," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 328(C).
    3. Chang, Miguel & Lund, Henrik & Thellufsen, Jakob Zinck & Østergaard, Poul Alberg, 2023. "Perspectives on purpose-driven coupling of energy system models," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 265(C).
    4. Thellufsen, Jakob Zinck & Lund, Henrik & Mathiesen, Brian Vad & Østergaard, Poul Alberg & Sorknæs, Peter & Nielsen, Steffen & Madsen, Poul Thøis & Andresen, Gorm Bruun, 2024. "Cost and system effects of nuclear power in carbon-neutral energy systems," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 371(C).
    5. Grochowicz, Aleksander & van Greevenbroek, Koen & Benth, Fred Espen & Zeyringer, Marianne, 2023. "Intersecting near-optimal spaces: European power systems with more resilience to weather variability," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 118(C).
    6. Walch, Alina & Rüdisüli, Martin, 2023. "Strategic PV expansion and its impact on regional electricity self-sufficiency: Case study of Switzerland," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 346(C).
    7. Lopez, Gabriel & Satymov, Rasul & Aghahosseini, Arman & Bogdanov, Dmitrii & Oyewo, Ayobami Solomon & Breyer, Christian, 2024. "Ocean energy enabling a sustainable energy-industry transition for Hawaiʻi," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 237(PC).
    8. Chen, Yi-kuang & Kirkerud, Jon Gustav & Bolkesjø, Torjus Folsland, 2022. "Balancing GHG mitigation and land-use conflicts: Alternative Northern European energy system scenarios," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 310(C).
    9. Guillot, Victor & Siggini, Gildas & Assoumou, Edi, 2023. "Interactions between land and grid development in the transition to a decarbonized European power system," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 175(C).
    10. M. Millinger & F. Hedenus & E. Zeyen & F. Neumann & L. Reichenberg & G. Berndes, 2025. "Diversity of biomass usage pathways to achieve emissions targets in the European energy system," Nature Energy, Nature, vol. 10(2), pages 226-242, February.
    11. Schwaeppe, Henrik & Thams, Marten Simon & Walter, Julian & Moser, Albert, 2024. "Finding better alternatives: Shadow prices of near-optimal solutions in energy system optimization modeling," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 292(C).
    12. Keiner, Dominik & Gulagi, Ashish & Satymov, Rasul & Etongo, Daniel & Lavidas, George & Oyewo, Ayobami S. & Khalili, Siavash & Breyer, Christian, 2024. "Future role of wave power in Seychelles: A structured sensitivity analysis empowered by a novel EnergyPLAN-based optimisation tool," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 303(C).
    13. Aditya Sinha & Aranya Venkatesh & Katherine Jordan & Cameron Wade & Hadi Eshraghi & Anderson R. Queiroz & Paulina Jaramillo & Jeremiah X. Johnson, 2024. "Diverse decarbonization pathways under near cost-optimal futures," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 15(1), pages 1-15, December.
    14. Lombardi, Francesco & Pickering, Bryn & Pfenninger, Stefan, 2023. "What is redundant and what is not? Computational trade-offs in modelling to generate alternatives for energy infrastructure deployment," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 339(C).
    15. Bobrowski, Jakub & Łaska, Grażyna, 2023. "Using spatial elimination and ranking methods in the renewable energy investment parcel search process," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 285(C).
    16. Finke, Jonas & Kachirayil, Febin & McKenna, Russell & Bertsch, Valentin, 2024. "Modelling to generate near-Pareto-optimal alternatives (MGPA) for the municipal energy transition," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 376(PA).
    17. Javed, Muhammad Shahzad & Jurasz, Jakub & Dąbek, Paweł Bronisław & Ma, Tao & Jadwiszczak, Piotr & Niemierka, Elżbieta, 2023. "Green manufacturing facilities – Meeting CO2 emission targets considering power and heat supply," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 350(C).
    18. Dubois, Antoine & Dumas, Jonathan & Thiran, Paolo & Limpens, Gauthier & Ernst, Damien, 2023. "Multi-objective near-optimal necessary conditions for multi-sectoral planning," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 350(C).
    19. Annika Gillich & Kai Hufendiek, 2022. "Asset Profitability in the Electricity Sector: An Iterative Approach in a Linear Optimization Model," Energies, MDPI, vol. 15(12), pages 1-31, June.
    20. Kachirayil, Febin & Weinand, Jann Michael & Scheller, Fabian & McKenna, Russell, 2022. "Reviewing local and integrated energy system models: insights into flexibility and robustness challenges," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 324(C).

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:plo:pclm00:0000560. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: climate (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://journals.plos.org/climate .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.