Sustainability index evaluation of thai energy system with alternative energy measures

Abstract

The sustainability of Thai energy system is the system that end users can select and utilize the energy to support economic activities without it having an environmental impact, and the energy price is appropriate for everyone. The sustainability level of Thailand is regarded as not exceptionally high due to facing other violent energy crises, energy shortages, environmental deterioration from high energy consumption, and abnormally high-energy prices due to unforecastable world events, including wars and disease epidemics. These events affect the world, and they are the obstacles that affect the development of Thai energy system to future sustainability. To prepare for unexpected situations, the energy management plans can be guidelines for Thailand to be a sustainability energy system, although the country encounters unpredicted energy issues. Energy management needs proper planning, correct decision-making tools, precise indicators, and good adaptation contingency plans for any situation. Therefore, this research anticipated the development of Thai energy system to sustainability under abnormal situations that may affect the system in the future. It was required to plan and prepare by studying the energy consumption of Thai energy system to achieve sustainability through sound energy management patterns and developing a sustainability index to measure the sustainable level of Thai energy system.

The development of sustainability assessment of an energy system depended on a sustainability index of 35 indicators and it is classified into 12 sub-dimensions, resulting in five dimensions of Thailand’s sustainable energy system: Energy, Environment, Economy, Human well-being, and Circular efficiency. These indicators would give the Sustainability Score (SS) that led to the classification of four sustainability levels. The developed index indicators would be applied in the energy management for sustainability by 2050, when Thailand encounters the three unstable situations as follows: (1) Thailand in a normal situation without external factors involved, (2)Thai energy system in a regional crisis that creates abnormally high price for fuels and high inflation, and (3) Thai energy system in a disease outbreak that brings a change in energy consuming behavior and regression of economic growth resulting in the abnormally high fuel prices. These three situations were assessed to find the most appropriate energy consumption management.

The energy models of end users and supply side users in 2050 for each situation were created to be analyzed to find the energy consumption pattern through energy management with suitable energy conservation measures, renewable energy measures, and others. The models would evaluate the sustainability level with the developed indicators. Based on the study, it was found that Thai energy system could be sustainable by managing the entire circle of energy. In other words, the management begins with end users and supply side users. According to the study, when the end user participates in energy conservation by reducing energy consumption, particularly in industry, business buildings, and households, the reduction of electricity from the distribution system by installing more solar PV rooftops would encourage the energy system to be more sustainable. Likewise, when power plants increase their production capacity by using renewable energy, especially wind power plants, an increase in the production capacity of biomass power plants decreases fossil fuel dependence. For transportation, this sector consumes a large quantity of fuel, and when the promotion of EVs, cars and biofuel becomes effective, it will push the energy system toward sustainability. While fuel-price fluctuation and inflation due to regional crisis, it affect the end users to be interested in installing the solar PV rooftop instead of consuming electricity from the distribution system, especially in commercial and residential sector. For transportation, more people use public transport because of increased fuel prices resulting in a decrease in fuel demand for personal cars. For a disease outbreak that causes a change in energy-consuming behavior, the demand for electricity rises, resulting in the end user sector being interested in self-electricity production. Moreover, power plants also allocate space to increase the production capacity from renewable energy, especially the building of solar power plants. Regarding assessing energy consumption models for sustainability, renewable energy and biofuel energy are more prominent. However, a higher selection of these two fuel types does not positively affect the ecosystem and natural resources because the from agriculture require water, minerals, and soils for cultivation. Or use renewable energy that requires minerals to produce parts for technological manufacturing to be effective. In consequence, when selecting these two energy sources, managing resources is the other way that requires a good plan and management to prepare for their use. Therefore, water and mineral management should be researched and analyzed with effective selection. In addition, the preparation to enhance the EVs cars, for example, the charging station or mineral components for battery production, the study of support minerals, should be planned and managed because Thailand is a country that primarily imports those materials. The promotion without any plan might cause future obstacles. Sustainability technology deployment needs high costs and might burden the end users. Creating a price mechanism for supporting these technologies will be an option and motivation to the end users to pay more attention, and it must be supported.