The optimum is not enough: A near-optimal solution paradigm for energy systems synthesis

The proposed concept is applied to three different real-world problems at the industrial, district, and urban scale. For all three test cases, many near-optimal solutions are identified with different equipment configurations but similar objective function values. Thus, a ranking of the identified solutions strictly based on a single objective value is not productive. Instead, we show that the near-optimal solutions analysis supports the decision process to identify a wider basis of system options, which may be consulted upon to reach rational synthesis decisions.