PyPSA — The Complete Guide: Optimising Power and Energy Systems in Python
PyPSA is an open-source Python framework for optimising and simulating power and energy systems. It started at TU Berlin and is now developed by a community. It models conventional power plants, variable renewable generation, hydro and storage, flexible demand, and AC and DC networks.
PyPSA
PyPSA community (TU Berlin)
Optimisation of power and energy systems — economic dispatch, capacity expansion, storage and sector coupling.
Get it from the vendorWhat you get
- Economic dispatch — including unit commitment for conventional plants.
- Capacity expansion planning — which plants, lines and storage to add over the years.
- Linearised power flow — in AC and DC networks.
- Stochastic scenarios — testing decisions under uncertainty.
- Sector coupling — linking different energy sectors in one model.
What to know
All work is done in code. PyPSA ships with the free HiGHS solver, but on very large problems commercial solvers are much faster. It is used by researchers, grid planners and utilities, and the MIT licence allows commercial work too.
Related tools
For full power flow calculations on networks — pandapower. For electricity and heat models built from components and flows — oemof.solph. For power flow and OPF in MATLAB or Octave — MATPOWER.
pandapower
University of Kassel and Fraunhofer IEE
Power grid analysis in Python — load flow, optimal power flow, short circuit and state estimation for distribution and transmission.
Get it from the vendor
oemof.solph
oemof developer group
A model generator for energy system optimisation (LP/MILP) — combined heat and power, storage, heat pumps and renewables.
Get it from the vendor
MATPOWER
MATPOWER development team
A toolbox for power flow and optimal power flow — a standard in research and teaching, and it runs in free GNU Octave.
Get it from the vendorVeraGrid (formerly GridCal)
Santiago Peñate Vera and contributors
Power grid planning and simulation software with a GUI — load flow, short circuit, OPF, contingencies and dynamic simulation.
Get it from the vendorThe bottom line
PyPSA is one of the main open tools for planning energy systems with a high share of renewables — free, transparent and suitable from a small model up to a national one.