Impact of the climate change on the site suitability for solar farms: Case study of Cameroon

Elvis Wati and Pierre Meukam

Renewable Energy, 2024, vol. 225, issue C

Abstract: It is widely agreed that in the coming decade the Earth's climate will undergo significant changes, which will considerably affect the ecosystems and populations in various ways. In this study, the climate change impact on the suitability of the recommended sustainable locations for siting solar PV facilities in Cameroon is assessed based on the downscaled climate projections and the geographic information system integrated with a multi-criteria decision-making technique. Spatial tools are used to identify the potential locations by extracting the constraint areas. The analytical hierarchy process is applied to weigh the criteria (climate, orography and vegetation) and calculate a land suitability index (LSI) to evaluate potential sites. Based on the Coordinated Regional Downscaling Experiment, the change in LSI towards the end of century is assessed considering two climate change scenarios, one optimistic and the other pessimistic. Results show that 13.7% of the study area is suitable for installing utility-size PV power plants with the highly suitable areas located mainly in the Extreme-North region of Cameroon. Under the RCP2.6 and RCP8.5 climate change scenarios, a very slight change in LSI (−5% ≤ LSI ≤ 5%) is projected for most of the potential sites across the country.

Keywords: Climate change; PV farm siting; Land suitability index; GIS; Multi-criteria decision making; CORDEX-CORE simulations (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:renene:v:225:y:2024:i:c:s0960148124003756

DOI: 10.1016/j.renene.2024.120310

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