Assessment and comparison of technological variants of the sodium tripolyphosphate production with the use of multi-criteria analysis

Sodium tripolyphosphate, a condensed phosphate applied in various industries, can be produced according to a new dry single-stage method or a classic spray drying two-stage method. To compare variants of sodium tripolyphosphate production, three multi-criteria methods (Borda, compromise programming and analytical hierarchy process) were applied. Assessment criteria of individual—best available technologies not entailing excessive costs options of sodium tripolyphosphate production and complex quality assessment calculation results allowed for the determination of a decision matrix for a choice of sodium tripolyphosphate production technology based on the applied decision methods. Applying the above methods allowed for ordering of the variants of tripolyphosphate production from the most to the least advantageous. The use of various criteria types (technological options and indices for complex quality assessment) as evaluation criteria in multi-criteria analysis allowed for an independent evaluation of the technology. Calculations from Borda and compromise programming methods showed that, in all cases, the assessment criteria used reached the highest possible level for dry single-stage technology for sodium tripolyphosphate production. Results obtained by analytical hierarchy process method confirmed the conclusions from Borda and compromise programming methods. Ranking of the developed technological solutions indicated the dry single-stage method of sodium tripolyphosphate production to be the advantageous technological variant.