TY - RPRT A1 - Hiller, Benjamin A1 - Walther, Tom T1 - Improving branching for disjunctive polyhedral models using approximate convex decompositions N2 - Disjunctive sets arise in a variety of optimization models and much esearch has been devoted to obtain strong relaxations for them. This paper focuses on the evaluation of the relaxation during the branch-and-bound search process. We argue that the branching possibilities (\ie binary variables) of the usual formulations are unsuitable to obtain strong bounds early in the search process as they do not capture the overall shape of the the entire disjunctive set. To analyze and exploit the shape of the disjunctive set we propose to compute a hierarchy of approximate convex decompositions and show how to extend the known formulations to obtain improved branching behavior. KW - disjunctive set KW - convex hull reformulation KW - branch-and-bound KW - approximate convex decomposition Y1 - 2017 ER - TY - INPR A1 - Hiller, Benjamin A1 - Saitenmacher, René A1 - Walther, Tom T1 - Analysis of operating modes of complex compressor stations N2 - We consider the modeling of operation modes for complex compressor stations (i.e., ones with several in- or outlets) in gas networks. In particular, we propose a refined model that allows to precompute tighter relaxations for each operation mode. These relaxations may be used to strengthen the compressor station submodels in gas network optimization problems. We provide a procedure to obtain the refined model from the input data for the original model. This procedure is based on a nontrivial reduction of the graph representing the gas flow through the compressor station in an operation mode. KW - model reformulation KW - bound tightening KW - multi-way compressor station KW - flow patterns Y1 - 2017 ER - TY - INPR A1 - Walther, Tom A1 - Hiller, Benjamin A1 - Saitenmacher, René T1 - Polyhedral 3D Models for compressors in gas networks N2 - Compressor machines are crucial elements in a gas transmission network, required to compensate for the pressure loss caused by friction in the pipes. Modelling all physical and technical details of a compressor machine involves a large amount of nonlinearity, which makes it hard to use such models in the optimization of large-scale gas networks. In this paper, we are going to describe a modelling approach for the operating range of a compressor machine, starting from a physical reference model and resulting in a polyhedral representation in the 3D space of mass flow throughput as well as in- and outlet pressure. KW - gas compressor modeling KW - polyhedral model KW - accuracy KW - z factor Y1 - 2017 ER - TY - RPRT A1 - Walther, Tom A1 - Hiller, Benjamin T1 - Modelling compressor stations in gas networks N2 - Gas networks are an important application area for optimization. When considering long-range transmission, compressor stations play a crucial role in these applications. The purpose of this report is to collect and systematize the models used for compressor stations in the literature. The emphasis is on recent work on simple yet accurate polyhedral models that may replace more simplified traditional models without increasing model complexity. The report also describes an extension of the compressor station data available in GasLib (http://gaslib.zib.de/) with the parameters of these models. KW - gas compressor modeling KW - compressor station KW - polyhedral model KW - MINLP model KW - nonlinear model Y1 - 2017 ER - TY - INPR A1 - Hiller, Benjamin A1 - Saitenmacher, René A1 - Walther, Tom T1 - Analysis of operating modes of complex compressor stations N2 - We consider the modeling of operation modes for complex compressor stations (i.e. ones with several in- or outlets) in gas networks. In particular, we propose a refined model that allows to precompute tighter relaxations for each operation mode. These relaxations may be used to strengthen the compressor station submodels in gas network optimization problems. We provide a procedure to obtain the refined model from the input data for the original model. Y1 - 2016 ER - TY - INPR A1 - Kreimeier, Timo A1 - Sauter, Henning A1 - Streubel, Tom A1 - Tischendorf, Caren A1 - Walther, Andrea T1 - Solving Least-Squares Collocated Differential Algebraic Equations by Successive Abs-Linear Minimization - A Case Study on Gas Network Simulation N2 - This paper studies the numerical simulation of gas networks with regulating elements using differential algebraic equations (DAEs) in combination with least-squares collocation. In contrast to classical collocation methods, more collocation points than degrees of freedom for the collocation polynomials are used. Recently, it has been shown that such a least-squares collocation has a regularizing effect for DAEs, in particular for DAEs with higher index. In each time step of the numerical integration, one has to solve a system of nonlinear equations that is nonsmooth due to the regulating elements in the gas networks. We consider four solvers one of which explicitly exploits the inherent nonsmooth nature. Numerical results are given for three different test cases with increasing complexity illustrating the feasibility of the proposed approach to approximate a solution of the DAE and the advantageous performance of the nonsmooth solver that is based on the concept of abs-linearization. KW - Abs-smooth Algorithmic Differentiation KW - Numerical Integration KW - Simulation of Gas Transportation Networks KW - Nonsmooth Optimization KW - SALMIN KW - Least-Squares Collocation Method KW - Target Values KW - Set Point Values KW - Controlling Regulators and Compressors Y1 - 2021 ER -