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Due to the current and foreseeable shifts in energy production, the trading and transport operations of gas will become more dynamic, volatile, and hence also less predictable.
Therefore, computer-aided support in terms of rapid simulation and control optimization will further broaden its importance for gas network dispatching.
In this paper, we aim to contribute and openly publish two new mathematical models for regulators, also referred to as control valves, which together with compressors make up the most complex and involved types of active elements in gas network infrastructures.
They provide full direct control over gas networks but are in turn controlled via target values, also known as set-point values, themselves.
Our models incorporate up to six dynamical target values to define desired transient states for the elements' local vicinity within the network.
That is, each pair of every two target values defines a bounding box for the inlet pressure, outlet pressure as well as the passing mass flow of gas.
In the proposed models, those target values are prioritized differently and are constantly in competition with each other, which can only be resolved dynamically at run-time of either a simulation or optimization process.
Besides careful derivation, we compare simulation and optimization results with predictions of the commercial simulation tool SIMONE.
Due to the current and foreseeable shifts towards carbon dioxide neutral energy production, which will likely result in balancing fluctuating renewable energy generation by transforming power-to-gas-to-power as well as building a large-scale hydrogen transport infrastructure, the trading and transport operations of gas will become more dynamic, volatile, and hence also less predictable.
Therefore, computer-aided support in terms of rapid simulation and control optimization will further broaden its importance for gas network dispatching.
In this paper, we aim to contribute and openly publish two new mathematical models for regulators, also referred to as control valves, which together with compressors make up the most complex and involved types of active elements in gas network infrastructures.
They provide direct control over gas networks but are in turn controlled via target values, also known as set-point values, themselves.
Our models incorporate up to six dynamical target values to define desired transient states for the elements' local vicinity within the network.
That is, each pair of every two target values defines a bounding box for the inlet pressure, outlet pressure as well as the passing mass flow of gas.
In the proposed models, those target values are prioritized differently and are constantly in competition with each other, which can only be resolved dynamically at run-time of either a simulation or optimization process.
Besides careful derivation, we compare simulation and optimization results with predictions of the widely adopted commercial simulation tool SIMONE, serving as our substitute for actual real-world transport operations.
In this paper, we describe an algorithmic framework for the optimal operation of transient gas transport networks consisting of a hierarchical MILP formulation together with a sequential linear programming inspired post-processing routine. Its implementation is part of the KOMPASS decision support system, which is currently used in an industrial setting.
Real-world gas transport networks are controlled by operating complex pipeline intersection areas, which comprise multiple compressor units, regulators, and valves. In the following, we introduce the concept of network stations to model them. Thereby, we represent the technical capabilities of a station by hand-tailored artificial arcs and add them to network. Furthermore, we choose from a predefined set of flow directions for each network station and time step, which determines where the gas enters and leaves the station. Additionally, we have to select a supported simple state, which consists of two subsets of artificial arcs: Arcs that must and arcs that cannot be used. The goal is to determine a stable control of the network satisfying all supplies and demands.
The pipeline intersections, that are represented by the network stations, were initially built centuries ago. Subsequently, due to updates, changes, and extensions, they evolved into highly complex and involved topologies. To extract their basic properties and to model them using computer-readable and optimizable descriptions took several years of effort.
To support the dispatchers in controlling the network, we need to compute a continuously updated list of recommended measures. Our motivation for the model presented here is to make fast decisions on important transient global control parameters, i.e., how to route the flow and where to compress the gas. Detailed continuous and discrete technical control measures realizing them, which take all hardware details into account, are determined in a subsequent step.
In this paper, we present computational results from the KOMPASS project using detailed real-world data.
Optimizing the transient control of gas networks is a highly challenging task.
The corresponding model incorporates the combinatorial complexity of determining the settings for the many active elements as well as the non-linear and non-convex nature of the physical and technical principles of gas transport.
In this paper, we present the latest improvements of our ongoing work to solve this problem for real-world, large-scale problem instances:
By adjusting our mixed-integer non-linear programming model regarding the gas compression capabilities in the network, we reflect the technical limits of the underlying units more accurately while maintaining a similar overall model size.
In addition, we introduce a new algorithmic approach that is based on splitting the complexity of the problem by first finding assignments for discrete variables and then determining the continuous variables as locally optimal solution of the corresponding non-linear program.
For the first task, we design multiple different heuristics based on concepts for general time-expanded optimization problems that find solutions by solving a sequence of sub-problems defined on reduced time horizons.
To demonstrate the competitiveness of our approach, we test our algorithm on particularly challenging historic demand scenarios.
The results show that high-quality solutions are obtained reliably within short solving times, making the algorithm well-suited to be applied at the core of time-critical industrial applications.