We propose a methodology for identifying and prioritizing the best potential locations for brine concentration facilities in the contiguous United States. The methodology uses a geographic information system and multicriteria decision analysis (GIS-MCDA) to prioritize the potential locations for brine concentration facilities based on thermodynamic, economic, environmental, and social criteria. By integrating geospatial data with a computational simulation of a real brine concentration system, an objective weighting method identifies the weights for 13 subcriteria associated with the main criteria. When considering multiple dimensions for decision making, brine concentration facilities centered in Florida were consistently selected as the best location, due to the high second-law efficiency, low transportation cost, and high capacity for supplying municipal water needs to nearby populations. For inland locations, Southeast Texas outperforms all other locations for thermodynamic, economic, and environmental priority cases. A sensitivity analysis evaluates the consistency of the results as the priority of a main criterion varies relative to other decision-making criteria. Focusing on a single subcriterion misleads decision making when identifying the best location for brine concentration systems, identifying the importance of the multicriteria methodology.
Keywords: GIS; MCDA; MLD; Shannon entropy; brine concentration; computational modeling; desalination.