Setting boundaries: Impact of district definition on the design and modelling of local energy communities
Semester or Master project
Fall 2024
In the realm of energy system modeling and optimization of local energy communities, the spatial definition of districts plays a crucial role in determining the efficacy and outcomes of various energy strategies. Currently, our model leverages low-voltage transformers to demarcate districts. However, the integration of district heating and cooling networks necessitates a reevaluation of this approach. Alternative methods such as using administrative regions, communes, neighborhoods, or even geometric constructs like Voronoi diagrams, could potentially offer more suitable frameworks for different objectives. Understanding the implications of these district definitions is essential for enhancing the accuracy and efficiency of energy distribution and optimization processes.
This project is closely integrated with two SFOE’s projects:
The project is closely integrated with the SFOE’s Swice project, which aims to complement the techno-economic approach to the energy transition with considerations of human well-being.
GISOptiTes (Potential assessment of large-scale seasonal thermal energy storage in Switzerland by means of GIS based energy modelling and optimization) project, which aims to increase synergies between top-down and bottom-up energy optimization tools through a combined top-down and bottom-up approach.
The main research questions can be outlined as follows:
What are relevant ways to define the district for a given objective?
How does the choice of the geographical system boundary influence the energy system optimization results?
What type of definition is more appropriate for what type of problem?
What are the features of the geographical system boundary definition that have the highest influence on the results?
The project will be supervised by Dr. Eduardo Pina (Postdoc, IPESE) and Dr. Luc Girardin (Postdoc, IPESE). If interested, please send your CV, with a short motivation letter, to eduardo.pina@epfl.ch.