Future Analysis to Define Guidelines for Wind Energy Production in Iran using Scenario Planning

Wind energy production is critical issue as renewable energy sources is continuously increasing over the last decade. The main focus of this study is wind power production which its share is already less than one percent but planned to supply over thirty percent of electricity consumption by 2025. In this study, scenario planning as an increasingly popular method for facilitating multi-criteria decision making and strategic management tool is used. The methodology has been designed in three stages of identifying the critical factors and driving forces affecting wind power industry in Iran, generating plausible scenarios by scenario wizard through cross impact balance analysis and proposing some guidelines for most optimistic, realistic and pessimistic scenarios to eliminate the barriers and promote installed wind power capacity. Considering the score of the scenarios as well as their Impact Score, the scenarios are sorted from most optimistic to most pessimistic. The main contribution of the paper is preparing a realistic view and considering internal and international situations of Iran, local barriers, necessity of attracting foreign investment, know how transfer and technology for manufacturing of turbine over 1 MW, clearly define and analyze the critical factors and driving Forces influencing conceivable futures of wind energy in Iran and propose some guidelines enabling quick respond to forthcoming changes and precise planning to reach desired vision. The results of this research are supposed to developed scenarios provide a detailed review of Iran's longterm wind energy planning and minimize plausible wonders and shocks.