The safe development of chemical industries requires adequate control of the environmental sustainability of the areas where enterprises are located. The purpose of the article is to develop and test a methodology for solving the multicriteria problem of choosing industrial zones for the development of chemical industries using the method of an additive global criterion. The novelty of the methodology lies in the multi-criteria and complexity of the tool and the presence of a statistical base, which allows it to be used for various socio-economic purposes at all levels of government. As the main research tools, the methods of multi-criteria selection of objects, one-dimensional data scaling, additive convolution of criteria, and methods of multivariate statistical analysis for verifying the results obtained and making a decision were used. The article describes the mathematical apparatus of the technique for solving the multicriteria problem of selecting objects by the method of an additive global criterion. The solution algorithm provides for a three-level integration of particular indicators using the methods of mathematical processing of an array of different-dimensional values. The procedure for selecting the vectors of the criterion space makes it possible to select industrial zones and obtain a global criterion using the additive convolution method. In order to test the methodology, the problem of choosing industrial zones for the potential development of chemical industries in the Russian region was solved. For the development of chemical production, industrial zones have been selected that are included in the above-average environmental sustainability group: Bavlinskaya, Nurlatskaya, Bugulminskaya, and Leninogorskaya. Tendencies of decrease in ecological stability of the zones, which have relatively safe industries on their territory but are adjacent to the zones of location of environmentally unfavorable industries, are revealed. The materials of the article can be used in the development of intelligent systems for monitoring and controlling the development of chemical industries, which allow monitoring the level of environmental safety of industrial zones, identifying sources of negative environmental impact with pursuing decision-making on the organization and planning of production systems in the territorial space.
