Sustainable management of water and energy resources is essential to achieving global development and climate goals. This study applies the ELECTRE method to evaluate and rank three strategies: solar-powered desalination (A), wind-powered energy and water storage (B), and smart irrigation with renewable energy (C). Expert input from 15 specialists was assessed against four criteria: resource efficiency, environmental impact, economic viability, and social acceptance. Results show that Alternative B achieves the highest overall score (4.193), reflecting strengths in environmental performance and public acceptance, followed closely by C (4.174) and A (4.113). These findings highlight the value of multi-criteria decision analysis in balancing environmental, economic, and social priorities for integrated water–energy planning. Limitations include reliance on expert judgment, sensitivity to criteria weighting, and the restriction to three alternatives. These constraints highlight the need to combine ELECTRE with other methods (e.g., AHP, TOPSIS) or sensitivity analyses in future studies.
Song et al. (Sun,) studied this question.