IPTC 11765
Analysis of Multicriteria Decision-Making Methodologies for the Petroleum Industry
Lev Virine SPE, and Derek Murphy SPE, Schlumberger Ltd.
Copyright 2007, International Petroleum Technology Conference
This paper was prepared for presentation at the International Petroleum Technology
Conference held in Dubai, U.A.E., 4–6 December 2007.
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Abstract
Decision-making within the petroleum industry is a
complex process involving extensive analysis of multiple
objectives based on a variety of diverse criteria. As part of the
decision-making process, companies often convert non-
monetary criteria to common monetary equivalents, i.e.
assigning costs allocations regarding public response to a
proposed project. However, this approach has many
limitations related to recognizing the company’s true financial
performance in comparison to quality, safety, environmental
concerns and other factors.
When nominal factors are involved, it may be practical for
decision-makers to rely on intuition and experience to guide
their decisions. However, when multi-criteria exist, simplistic
intuitive process may not be applicable in which case a more
detailed and robust process is required.
The process of multicriteria decision-making starts with
eliciting judgment concerning corporate decision-making
policy, in particular identifying levels of risk tolerance. By
interviewing key decision-makers and reviewing historical
decision making policy, it is possible to identify and quantify
an organizations strategic preferences and overall objectives.
Such findings can then be used in the multicriteria decision
analysis process to further distinguish a company’s priorities
and requirements.
This paper examines different multicriteria decision
making methodologies including the multi-attribute utility
theory (MAUT), the simple multi-attribute rating technique
(SMART), and the analytic hierarchy process (AHP). This
paper presents an independent review and comparison of each
method while highlighting how each method can be applied
for evaluating different types of decisions within the
petroleum industry. This paper also creates discussion around
heuristic, intuitive as well as other mental strategies that exist,
placing focus on their individual strengths and weaknesses.
Intuitive and Formalized Approaches for Multicriteria
Decision-Making
Multicriteria decision-making is a process that can assist
an individual and/or an organization to effectively incorporate
and evaluate all known factors and outcomes associated with a
required decision. The goal of this process is to provide the
decision-maker with sufficient information in order to choose
an alternative that results in the most feasible and optimal
outcome.
Traditionally, many decisions involving multiple
objectives and trade-offs are made intuitively by a decision-
maker without sophisticated analysis or examination. This
style of decision-making relies primarily on various mental
simplification techniques by each individual in determining
the specific decision of choice.
In many cases these techniques, or heuristics, lead to high
quality decisions, however they are often polluted by
individual biases and predictable mental errors. In the case of
oil and gas exploration and production, such biases may
possibly lead to very damaging mistakes.
Over the last few decades decision-making strategies in the
oil and gas industry have evolved into more advanced and
complex methodologies based on quantitative and qualitative
practices i.e. comparative risk assessments cost-benefit
analysis, and several other techniques. Most of these
methodologies emphasize on converting non-monetary
decision-making criteria to a common monetary equivalent
(Figure 1). However this approach has two major limitations:
1. Conversion of some non-monetary criteria to a
more common monetary equivalent is not possible
without making required assumptions, which can
be irrational and inappropriate. One area where this
issue is often encountered is in the topic of safety.
What project should be selected: a project with a
low economic return which maintains a high safety
standard for all parties involved, or a project with a
high economic return with a low safety standard?
Such practices around safety are not restricted to
the petroleum industry and can be viewed in a
variety of industries worldwide. For example, the
Department of Transportation (DOT) in North
America makes decisions regarding the selection
and timing of projects focused on highway
improvement by analyzing a variety of factors, one
in particular the accepted cost of human life, which
for decision-making purposes is $3 million US
dollars [1]. In contrast, the U.S. Environmental
1
2 IPTC 11765
Protection Agency (EPA) is using $3.7 million per
life when making decisions about water treatment
requirements. In general, the cost of human life or
injury is considered unethical to determine. In most
cases petroleum companies analyze safety issues
separately from project economics using a different
set of indicators, which cannot be simply converted
to a monetary value.
2. Given the decision-maker is able to convert non-
monetary decision-making criteria to a common
monetary equivalent, such monetary value is very
difficult to measure and calculate due to the
multiple risks and uncertainties. For example, the
decision to invest in advanced technology aimed to
improve the efficiency of a pipeline or facility to
improve overall project performance is often very
difficult to measure in strict monetary terms and
cannot be analyzed without making a mixture of
assumptions.
Multi-Criteria Decision-Making
Approaches
Intuitive Thinking Structured Decision Analysis
Process
Comparative Risk
Multicriteria Decision
Assessment Using
Analysis (MCDA)
Common Moneratary
Methods
Equivalent
Figure 1: Intuitive and Formalized Approaches for Multicriteria
Decision-Making
One of the more accepted approaches designed to address
such challenges is the multi-criteria decision analysis (MCDA)
methodology. This methodology can serve as a framework for
structured decision analysis processes in most organizations
[2,3].
Psychology of Decision-Making with Multiple Criteria
Decision-makers frequently make judgments involving
complex issues using simplified strategies and/or heuristics.
An example of this approach is called the recognition heuristic
[4]. If there are two alternatives, decision-makers typically
select a choice based on the alternative they recognize. For
example, if decision-makers are choosing between two
suppliers, instead of analyzing all of the pros and cons of the
components, the decision-makers will most likely select the
supplier they recognize. This explains why people often select
a product based on brand name instead of performing detailed
analysis of features and benefits.
But what if both suppliers are equally recognized?
Decision-makers may choose to make a random selection
intuitively or alternatively they may choose the supplier that
served them previously. In addition to past performance,
decision-makers can be affected by recent events, media
publication and favoured presentations or communications.
Such influences are related to the professed availability
heuristic [5]. For example, the decision-maker attends a
presentation about the importance of quality management
processes. The speaker presents examples of some successful
projects where quality management processes were followed
as well as how the neglect of quality management led to
disastrous consequences. After the presentation, the decision-
maker will probably think that quality is the primary criterion
that needs to be considered. As a result, a decision-maker may
concentrate on quality improvement to the detriment of cost,
safety, and environment concerns.
Another mental strategy associated with the decision-
making process is called the lexicographic heuristic [6]. In
this process, the decision-maker ranks criteria from the most
important to the least important. For example, the price of a
component will be considered the most important criteria,
performance will be rather important, and the country of
manufacturing will be the least important. If all components
have the same price, the decision-maker will make a selection
largely based on performance. If all components have equal
performance, the decision-maker will make a choice based on
the country of manufacturing.
This heuristic is called lexicographic because a similar
algorithm is used to order words in dictionaries. For example,
“dusk” will follow “desk” because when the first letters are
the equal, in this case the letter “d”, the second letters are used
to place the word in order. If one criterion is significantly
more important than another, the lexicographic heuristic
works well. However, if the relationship between different
criteria is complex, this heuristic can cause problems. If the
decision-maker is basing the decision on a weighted scale
relating to economics, public relations (PR), safety and
environmental issues, the ranking becomes much more
complex, and the ability to make the correct choice becomes
more difficult.
Another heuristic is called elimination by aspect [7].
Elimination by aspect is a mental strategy in which the
decision-maker eliminates a potential choice if it does not
satisfy certain conditions. For example, a decision-maker may
eliminate all alternatives that have any negative safety issues.
As a result, only a few potential alternatives will remain. The
problem with this heuristic is that some potentially good
alternatives can be eliminated because this approach does not
include an analysis of the trade-offs between the given
choices. For example, safety conditions may not be fully
satisfied; however, all other attributes may be very satisfied
and additional safety measures may be able to be put in place
with additional investment. If the decision-maker uses the
elimination by aspect heuristic, depending upon the ranking
schema, the decision-maker could unintentionally reject
favorable alternatives over alternatives that are less than
optimal.
Intuitive decision-making strategies cannot be ignored
because in many case it is the only practical method of making
decisions with multiple objectives. However, if there is a
concern that intuitive strategies are insufficient in assisting the
decision-maker to select the optimal choice, there are a
number of MCDA methods available.
IPTC 11765
Overview of Multicriteria Decision-Making Analysis
Methods
The common goal behind all MCDA methods is to
evaluate and choose alternatives based on multiple criteria
using structured analysis. MCDA synthesizes the information
and ranks alternatives using different approaches. Each of
these methods has different strengths and weaknesses [8].
Some techniques rank the alternatives, some identify single
optimal alternatives, other differentiates between acceptable
and unacceptable options.
As in a case of comparative risk analysis using common
monetary equivalent, the MCDA decision analysis includes
four phases: decision framing, modeling, quantitative analysis,
and monitoring and evaluation of decisions selected. Below
are the specific MCDA activities associated with the different
phases of the decision analysis process:
1. Decision framing phase: different project
objectives, decision-making criteria and subcriteria
hierarchies are developed based on expert
judgment.
2. Modeling phase: quantitative criteria weights are
obtained from decision-makers and stakeholders.
3. Quantitative analysis phase: alternatives are
chosen based on structured algorithms using
criteria scores and weights. A number of software
applications are currently available to facilitate this
analysis process.
4. Monitoring and evaluation phase: decisions that
are previously taken may be re-evaluated given
changes in corporate policy i.e. a change in
corporate policy regarding environmental
protection. In practice, this means the process of
eliciting judgments particularly regarding
quantization of decision-making criteria weights
may be repeated.
Decision making criteria associated with the petroleum
industry can be subdivided into four categories:
1. Overall operational performance: which can be
expressed by a common monetary equivalent such
as, net present value (NPV), rate of return (ROR),
and others.
2. Safety and environmental criteria.
3. Public relations, political and organizational
criteria.
4. Technology-related criteria: such as quality,
performance, and reliability of associated
technologies and machinery.
In addition to these four categories, a petroleum company
may have both long term and short objectives, which may not
be fully balanced. For example, the company may secure the
sustainable reserve renewal rate through acquisitions and
exploration while maintaining a positive cash flow through
production of daily operations. MCDA methods can help to
balance such objectives while providing insight toward the
company’s decision-making policy and expectations.
Different MCDA methods are applicable for different
problems related to the exploration and production of
petroleum. However it is important to apply the selected
3
MCDA method consistently in order to be able to compare
and reevaluate the decisions made regarding similar problems.
The following groups of MCDA methods are applicable
to petroleum:
1. Multi-attribute utility theory (MAUT): This theory
is based on the assumption that the decision-maker
is rational and consistent: the goal of the decision-
maker is to maximize utility value. MAUT
converts different criteria into one common scale
of utility for evaluation.
2. Analytical hierarchy process (AHP): uses pairwise
comparison of decision-criteria to elicit expert
judgment [9,10]. AHP assumes that people are
more capable to make a comparison than absolute
judgment.
3. Simple Multiattribute Rating Technique (SMART):
is dependent on identifying relevant attributes
while assigning value to measure the attribute in
the alternative [11,12]. Each attribute should have
a different weight, which reflects the importance of
the attribute to the decision maker. SMART is easy
to use and proven to be accurate. It can be used for
balancing technology related and economic
objectives.
4. Outranking approach: is based on the notion that
one alternative may be dominant when compared
to another. It occurs when one alternative is
stronger relative to a specific criteria and no worse
than contending alternatives in all other criteria.
Outranking techniques are most appropriate when
criteria metrics cannot be easy aggregated, units
are incompatible and measuring scales vary over
wide ranges. In the exploration and production of
oil and gas, this method can be related largely
towards balancing the significance between public
relations and economic issues.
Each MCDA method focuses on different approaches to
eliciting decision-maker values, preferences and decision-
making policies. The primary goal of MCDA methods is to
develop a better understanding of the decision-makers values,
which will effectively lead to higher quality decisions being
made.
All MCDA methods employ different reality checks
designed to ensure that assumption and choices represent
decision-maker preferences. Where detailed analysis is not
suitable, intuitive decision-making may provide strong realty
checks for a problem with multiple objectives.
MCDA methods are currently proving effective in a wide
variety of industries outside of oil and gas. These include but
are not limited to pharmaceutical, environmental protection,
and aerospace. Examples of their application are as follows:
• The National Aeronautics and Space
Administration (NASA) initiates the use of
MCDA methods specifically the analytical
hierarchy process for the selection of projects at
Kennedy Space Center [13]
• USA and Russia evaluate plutonium disposition
options using multiattribute utility theory [14].
4 IPTC 11765

• IT industry uses analytic hierarchy process for 3. Performing consistency check to ensure that the
project portfolio management, particular to build principle known as transitivity rule is not violated: if
cross-prioritized portfolio lists [15]. alternative A preferred over alternative B and
• Computer manufactures are using multi-criteria alternative B preferred over alternative C, alternative
decision-making methodologies and tools for A should be preferred over alternative C. In many
advanced project portfolio management [16]. cases, especially with higher number of pairwise
MCDA is currently employed throughout the petroleum comparisons, perfect consistency is difficult to
industry for selecting alternatives under uncertainty. For achieve.
example, an evaluation of alternatives related to the NPV Safety Environment Public
environmental impact of oil and gas exploration and Relations
production [17,18]. Alternative 1 0.38 0.48 0.37 0.14
Alternative 2 0.24 0.25 0.30 0.62
Alternative 3 0.38 0.27 0.33 0.24
Case study: Project Portfolio Selection Using MCDA
Figure 2: Hierarchy of project selection problem
To demonstrate how such methods are applied we offer the
Pairwise Most How much Num.
following case study. Below are three possible projects for
comparison important more important rating
review. Each alternative represents real time problems faced
criterion
by oil companies operating in Western Canada:
NPV-Environment NPV Strongly 4
NPV-Safety NPV Almost Equally 1.5
Project alternative 1: Development of a gas field in
relative proximity to a largely populated city. A number of NPV-PR NPV Moderately 3
sour gas wells may be drilled. Necessary safety measures can Environment-PR PR Moderately 2
be taken to ensure that regulator would approve the project Environment- Safety Strongly 4
however there is a concern that city residents will oppose the Safety
project even regulatory requirements are met. Safety-PR Safety Strongly 3
Table 1: Summary of pairwise comparisons

Project alternative 2: Development of a large sweet gas

field in an environmentally sensitive area, located close to a NPV Safety Environment PR
park with a significant population of endangered animals. NPV 1 1.5 4 3
There is a concern that environmental organizations will Safety 1/1.5 1 4 3
oppose the project by running public relationship campaign Environment 1/4 1/4 1 1/2
even though regulatory requirements can be met. PR 1/3 1/3 2 1
Sum: 2.25 3.08 11 7.5
Project alternative 3: Development of a small gas field in Table 2: Pairwise comparison matrix
an undeveloped area. The development will require significant
investment with many uncertainties. Production from this field 4. Calculating priorities using a pairwise comparison
will be not very significant. The field is accessible by a private matrix. It can be achieved by summing the values of
road with is known for high number of animal and human each column, dividing each matrix element by its
fatalities. column total, and finally computing the average of
the elements in each row. These average values
Selection of the alternative can be done based on analysis become the priorities. The priorities for the
of the following multiple criteria: economics, public relations, aforementioned example are:
public and employee safety as well as environmental
protection. These attributes cannot be analyzed using common NPV=0.42
monetary equivalent. Therefore the selection of the project Safety=0.35
will be performed using MCDA. Environment=0.09
PR=0.14
Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP)
5. Computing overall priorities for each alternative
The modeling and analysis process using AHP comprises using the hierarchy (Figure 2) and priorities for each
of the following steps: criterion shown above. To do this, the decision-
1. Developing a graphical representation of the maker should also use pairwise comparison to
problem in terms of the overall goal, the criteria to determine priorities among alternatives for each of
be used and the decision alternatives (Figure 2). the following criteria: NPV, safety, environment,
2. Establishing priorities using pairwise comparison and public relations. For example, a pairwise
(Table 1). Results of pairwise comparison can be comparison matrix for criteria public relationship is
expressed using pairwise comparison matrix (Table shown in Table 3:
2). Actual numbers in this table were solicited from
experts, experienced in similar projects.
IPTC 11765 5

Multiattribute Utility Theory (MAUT)

Altern 1 Altern 2 Altern 3 The modeling and analysis using MAUT comprises of the
Altern. 1: Sour gas field 1 1/4 1/2 following steps:
close to big city 1. Identifying overall goal, decision alternatives, and
Altern 2. Large gas 4 1 3 decision-making criteria, which are also called
field close to the park attributes.
Altern 3: Small gas 2 1/3 1 2. Developing utility functions for selected attributes
field in new area using interviewing techniques [19,20]. These utility
Table 3: Pairwise comparison matrix for criterion public functions reflect attitude of the decision-makers
relationship towards risk. For example, one of the attributes
related to project alternative 1 is public response
The priorities for criterion related to public relations are: towards drilling sour well close to the city. It can be
Alternative 1: 0.14 measured by distance between the well site and city
Alternative 2: 0.62 above minimum distance to sour gas wells
Alternative 3: 0.24 permitted by regulator. The decision maker may
asked to express their judgment about public
The same procedure is used to calculate the overall priority response to drilling using scale from 0 (no
coefficient. It is important to note that in this example higher response) to 10 (very strong response) depending on
coefficients for each alternative are associated with more the distance. The result of the interviewing can be
issues (safety, environment, and PR) and lower NPV. presented on the chart (Figure 4):
10
NPV Safety Environment Public

Utility
Relationship 8
Alternative 1 0.38 0.48 0.37 0.14
6
Alternative 2 0.24 0.25 0.30 0.62
Alternative 3 0.38 0.27 0.33 0.24 4

2
Figure 3: Priorities for each alternative using each criterion
0
For example, overall coefficient reflecting potential issues 30.0 20.0 10.0 0.0
for alternative 1 (sour gas field close to big city): 0.38*0.42 +
Distance (km)
0.48*0.35 + 0.37*0.09 + 0.14*0.14 = 0.38, coefficient for
alternative 2: 0.30; coefficient for alternative 3 = 0.32. In
Figure 4: Example of utility function
other words alternative 1 has significantly more issues, and
alternative 2 should be chosen. Intuitive reality check can 3. Transforming value for each attribute to utility
confirm this selection. scale. For example for distance 13 km above
The major strength of AHP is that pairwise comparison minimum permitted distance to sour gas well
judgment is easier to elicit than absolute judgment. As a result expected utility equals 9. In order to perform this
AHP is easy to implement in an organization. Actual analysis transformation, utility usually defined using
can be performed using specialized off-the-shelf software mathematical function, such as exponential
tools. The weakness of AHP is that in many cases weights function. Such utility functions should be defined
obtained from pairwise judgment may not truly reflect a for each attribute and for each alternative based on
decision maker’s preference. Also mathematical procedure to common scale.
calculate priorities may yield illogical results: ranking based 4. Determining relative weight for each attribute using
on AHP may not fully satisfy transitivity rule. interviewing techniques. For example.
AHP can be used for decision analysis in the petroleum NPV=0.38
industry for analysis of many problems. However it is Safety=0.32
recommended: Environment=0.13
1. Number of pairwise comparisons for different PR=0.17
criteria should not be more than few dozens. 5. Calculate total score for all alternatives. These
2. Total number of alternatives should be not more than scores can be different the scores obtained by other
10-15. methods, such as AHP, however overall choice is
3. If historical data about organizational choices are alternative 3.
available, it is recommended to use this data to come Alternative 1: 0.45 (0.38 in AHP)
up with numerical rating. For example, of oil Alternative 2: 0.26 (0.30 in AHP)
company already had to make a choice related to Alternative 3: 0.29 (0.32 in AHP)
sour gas drilling for a number of times, this Using MAUT it is easy to compare alternative whose
information can be used for the rating of the criteria. overall scores are expressed as single numbers. Many
decision-makers prefer to express net utility in non-monetary
6 IPTC 11765
terms. However MAUT has a number of weaknesses. Very
often maximizing utility may not be important for decision-
makers. In addition, the MAUT method requires rigorous
stakeholder preference solicitation, which is proven to be
expensive and time consuming. Another weakness of MAUT
is related to the fact, that oil and gas companies often have
working interest in different projects. Different partners may
be different decision profiles and attitude towards risks. Since
utilities cannot be easy aggregated, eliciting utility function
from project partners can be challenging.
MAUT can be useful tool for decision analysis where
maximizing utility is important to the decision-maker. In this
case utility values solicited once can be used for multiple
similar projects on consistent based.
Sensitivity Analysis
Sensitivity analysis is an important step associated with
any of the MCDA methods. Results from the analysis for real-
life problems related to the petroleum industry can be very
sensitive to uncertainty in weights assigned to different
attributes, utility functions, values associated with pairwise
comparison and other parameters solicited from decision-
makers.
For example, if in AHP example pairwise comparison
NPV vs. environment and safety vs. environment can be
changed so environment will become equality important.
New weight coefficients will be
NPV=0.33
Safety=0.27
Environment=0.22
PR=0.18
Result of analysis can be different:
Alternative 1: 0.37
Alternative 2: 0.32
Alternative 3: 0.31
As a result, alternative 3 (small field) should be selected
instead of alternative 2 (large field close to park). Results of
the analysis can be presented on the chart (Figure 5).
0.4
Coefficient
0.35
0.3
1 1.5 2 2.5 3 3.5 4 4.5
NPV vs Environment
Safety vs Environment
Weight placed on turnover
Figure 5: Sensitivity analysis for weight placed on turnover
High sensitivity to weights is very common in real-life
problems associated to the petroleum industry. If such high
sensitivity occurs, it is important to perform the following
actions:
1. Review other factors, which would affect
decision, for example technology considerations
for different alternatives.
2. Repeat the process of eliciting judgment related to
weight, for example organize a group discussion.
3. Review historical data related to selection of
different alternatives.
4. Monitor and evaluate decisions during the course
of project using consistent MCDA models
especially if attitude toward environment, PR and
other attributes are tend be changing.
Conclusions
1. MCDA methods provide a powerful framework for
decision analysis where intuitive decision making
and comparative risk assessment based on common
monetary equivalent have serious limitations.
2. Intuitive decision-making related to making choices
with multiple objectives is based on a number of
simplification mental techniques (heuristics), which
in some cases can lead to predictable mental errors
(biases).
3. The main advantage of applying MCDA methods
are less focused on selecting the “best” alternative
and more directed toward providing a foundation
for enhanced understanding of the decision-makes
preferences and policies. The focus of the MCDA
method process is to ensure the decision-maker is
eliciting judgment related to problems with multiple
objectives.
4. Different MCDA methods applied to the same
problem can yield different results. Therefore
MCDA methods must be selected to ensure
suitability for a particular problem. Choices
selected based on monetary equivalents and MCDA
approaches, as well as intuitive choices can be
different.
5. All MCDA methods include various reality checks
designed to ensure that original assumptions and
choices are representing decision-maker
Alternative 1
preferences.
6. Results of analysis can be very sensitive to
uncertainty in weighting coefficients, attribute
Alternative 3 values, utility functions and other parameters
obtained as a result of subjective judgment.
Alternative 2
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IPTC 11765 7

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