Improved AHP–TOPSIS model for the comprehensive risk evaluation of oil and gas pipelines

A comprehensive and objective risk evaluation model of oil and gas pipelines based on an improved analytic hierarchy process(AHP)and technique for order preference by similarity to an ideal solution(TOPSIS)is established to identify potential hazards in time.First,a barrier model and fault tree analysis are used to establish an index system for oil and gas pipeline risk evaluation on the basis of five important factors:corrosion,external interference,material/construction,natural disasters,and function and operation.Next,the index weight for oil and gas pipeline risk evaluation is computed by applying the improved AHP based on the five-scale method.Then,the TOPSIS of a multi-attribute decision-making theory is studied.The method for determining positive/negative ideal solutions and the normalized equation for benefit/cost indexes is improved to render TOPSIS applicable for the comprehensive risk evaluation of pipelines.The closeness coefficient of oil and gas pipelines is calculated by applying the improved TOPSIS.Finally,the weight and the closeness coefficient are combined to determine the risk level of pipelines.Empirical research using a long-distance pipeline as an example is conducted,and adjustment factors are used to verify the model.Results show that the risk evaluation model of oil and gas pipelines based on the improved AHP–TOPSIS is valuable and feasible.The model comprehensively considers the risk factors of oil and gas pipelines and provides comprehensive,rational,and scientific evaluation results.It represents a new decision-making method for systems engineering in pipeline enterprises and provides a comprehensive understanding of the safety status of oil and gas pipelines.The new system engineering decision-making method is important for preventing oil and gas pipeline accidents.

Improved AHP method and its application in lake environmental comprehensive quality evaluation—a case study of Xuanwu Lake, Nanjing, China

The relative importance of each pollution factor in analytical hierarchy process (AHP) method comes from pooling expert opinions in general. Because expert opinions are based on information and judgment criteria, determining their weight may lead to uncertainty.. Therefore, an improved AHP method had been developed. The process of the improved AHP method involved four key procedures. The weights of pollution factors were completely related to the objective monitoring data through the standardization of these procedures. The environmental comprehensive quality of water and sediment of Xuanwu Lake, Nanjing, China had been evaluated. The environmental quality comprehensive indices (EQCI) of the water in 1991-1995 and 1996-2000 were 3.32 and 1.85, respectively, indicating that the water quality improved. The EQCI of the sediment in 1995 and 2000 indicates that the sediment contamination decreased from 1995 to 2000. Such results agreed with the fact that the lake had been under comprehensive control. However, with the classical AHP method, the EQCI of the sediment in the northwestern part of the lake may have indicated that sediment contamination increased from 1995 to 2000. The discrepancy may have resulted from the judgment difference of the experts. The improved AHP method can avoid arbitrariness of subjective judgment and can reflect the real influential factors of environment pollution in different periods or regions.

Investigation on the Long Term Operational Stability of Underground Energy Storage in Salt Rock

Underground energy storage is an important function of all energy supply systems,and especially concerning the seemingly eternal imbalance between production and demand.Salt rock underground energy storage,for one,is widely applied in both traditional and renewable energy fields;and this particular technique can be used to store natural gas,hydrogen,and compressed air.However,resource diversification and structural complexity make the supply system increasingly uncertain with the passing years,leading to great challenges for energy storage facilities in the present,and perhaps going into the future as well.Hence,it is necessary to research the operation stability of underground energy storage further.In this paper,a stability evaluation index system of Underground Gas Storage(UGS)is constructed with natural gas as the main medium,according to FLAC 3D cavity creep simulation software,along with fuzzy membership function to comprehensively determine the impact factor scoring model;the subjective weight is calculated based on the improved Analytic Hierarchy Process(AHP),the objective weight is calculated by the Entropy Weight Method(EWM),the combined constant weight is obtained by combining the variance maximization theory,and introducing the variable weight theory to obtain a more accurate combined variable weight.Finally,with this all being considered and accounted for,and with the four different conditions designed for UGS deployment case analysis and verification taken into consideration,the combined variable weight evaluation achieved excellent results;compared with the traditional constant weight method,in fact,the new evaluation results are more rigorous and objective.

Improved AHP Method and Its Application in the Evaluation of Agricultural Mechanization

On the basis of analyzing the shortage of scale measure of the current AHP, and following base principIe of two comparison: principle of reward-punishment and principle of conversion, translation function and conciliation coefficient have been structured. This article advances a new measure which structuring translation function and conciliation coefficient. The result of application of improved AHP on the synthesis evaluation of agricultural mechanization is satisfactory.