A hierarchical model for biodiesel plant location in Brazil

This paper presents a location study for biodiesel industrial plants in Brazil, considering the existing infrastructure, oleaginous plantation potential and socio-economic data. The output was a hierarchical classification of suitable municipalities for industrial plants and production cycle placements. The methodology consisted of defining the location factors, territorial supply and industrial demand typology as input values. The location model collated the supply and demand variables using a fuzzy operator, normalised the outputs and produced hierarchic indicators. The input and output data were processed in a geographic information systems environment using digital maps. The results were analysed for six sites pre-indicated by the Brazilian state Oil and Gas Enterprise, which has confirmed and implemented at three of the proposed locations and has chosen two new placements based on the regions achieving good indicators in the study. Relevance and originality can be evaluated from the effective decision support provided for stakeholders and by association of industrial location, geoprocessing and fuzzy set knowledge.