Determination of relative significance factor of impact categories based on fuzzy multiattribute decision-making method

A relative significance factor of an impact category is the external weight of the impact category and plays an important role in life cycle assessment(LCA). Many multiattribute decision-making (MADM) methods such as analytical hierarchy process(AHP), the rank-order centroid method and the fuzzy method are proposed to determine the relative significance factor of an impact category. However, in previous research, it is shown that, the AHP approach is difficult for experts rendering consistent judgment when the number of pairwise comparisons increases, the rank-order method has some insurmountable shortcomings, the key issue to use fuzzy set theory is its complexity. In order to address this problem, a new simple and efficient method is proposed to determine relative significance factor in a more efficient manner. An example to determine relative significance factor of impact categories is shown to illustrate the efficiency of the proposed method.