Global optimization of larger district-heating networks

Solve global optimization problems for district-heating networks substantially larger than the networks considered in the paper, extending the demonstrated computational approach to such instances.

Background

The paper develops a spatial branch-and-bound method for globally optimizing stationary district-heating-network operation with flexible flow directions, multiple suppliers, cycles, and thermal storage. Although the computational results demonstrate improved performance on generated and real-world networks, the conclusion identifies scaling to even larger problems as an explicit open challenge for future work.