Open Source Tool for the Analysis and Simulation of Urban Energy Infrastructures

Abstract

A rapid transformation of energy systems in cities is essential to tackle the global challenges caused by the climate change. Linking buildings to other urban energy sectors like heat and gas is of paramount importance for a synergistic utilization of the respective clean flexibility options such as heat pumps. This paper introduces an open source GIS-based tool, called FlexiGIS-Grid for setting up synthetic typologies of power, heat and gas networks in districts. It couples two open source models FlexiGIS and rivus. It has been found for the selected case study that the electrification of heat sector using heat pumps offers a cost-effective solution and can completely replace the need of natural gas as a fuel. However, distribution grid expansion is required to enhance the power network in order to meet the heat demand using heat pumps. Another key finding of this research confirms the feasibility of using hydrogen to Substitute the dependency on natural gas resources, in which domestic heating technologies should be deployed to complement the hydrogen sector in satisfying the heat demand in the investigated district.