**2. Materials and Methods**

The authors used the following methods to achieve the objectives and outlines in the introduction:

	- - Weight (W)—the relative importance of a given factor in the range from 0.00 to 1.00 (0.00—insignificant factor; 1.00—significant factor). The total weight −1.00;
	- -Rating (R)—on a scale from 1 to 5. The higher rating, the more like to attain;
	- - Weighted score—that was computed by multiplying each factor's weight by its rating;
	- - Total Weighted Score (TWS) = (W) × (R);
	- - Internal Factors Ratio (IFR) = (S TWS)/(W TWS).
	- - External Factors Ratio (EFR) = (O TWS)/(T TWS) [12–15].

The template of the Weighted SWOT analysis is presented in Table 1.


**Table 1.** The example of the Weighted SWOT analysis.

The authors have described the most popular energy sources in the following aspects:


The LCOE is calculated and discussed in this section from an economic point of view (excluding transfers such as grants, taxes, or other financial incentives (e.g., the LCOE calculated from a financial or investor's point of view include these transfers)). The LCOE is calculated as follows: (3)

$$\text{LCOE} = \text{ACC} + \text{VOMC} + \text{FC} + \text{FOMC} \tag{1}$$

• "ACC, VOMC, FOMC, and FC—annualized capital costs, variable O & M costs, fixed O & M costs, and fuel costs.

All these costs are expressed in terms of energy (\$/MWh). ACC and FOMC are calculated as presented below" (4):

$$\text{ACC} = \text{(OC} \, \ast \, \text{CRF} \, \ast \, 1000) / \text{(CAF} \, \ast \, 24 \, \ast \, 365) \tag{2}$$

$$\text{FOMC} = (\text{FXC} \ast 1000) / (\text{CAF} \ast 24 \ast 365) \tag{3}$$

• OC means a lump-sum investment of a facility (\$/kW), and FXC is the annual fixed costs \$/kW. CRF is the capacity recovery factor that converts the costs expressed in terms of capacity to the related costs in terms of energy. CAF is the capacity availability factor.

The fuel cost does not apply to renewable technologies, except biomass. It is determined based on the heat content of a fuel (HC), fuel prices (FP), and the heat rate of the system (HR). Fuel prices are in USD per metric ton of coal. Heat content—the amount of heat, in kilocalories (Kcal) or megajoules (MJ), divided by one physical unit of the fuel (MJ/kg). "Heat rate is the inverse of the thermal efficiency of a power plant; it refers to the

amount of heat needed to produce one unit of electric power (MJ/kWh). Thus, the fuel cost (FC) was calculated as:

$$\text{FC} = \text{(FP/FIC)} \ast \text{HR} \tag{4}$$

Finally, the CRF is derived by using the discount rate (r) and the economic life (n) of a plant as follows" [15,16]:

$$\text{CRF} = \left\{ \mathbf{r} \, \* \, \langle \mathbf{1} + \mathbf{r} \rangle \mathbf{n} \right\} / \left\{ \left\| \langle \mathbf{1} + \mathbf{r} \rangle \mathbf{n} \right\| - 1 \right\} \tag{5}$$
