A Modular Co-Simulation Platform for Comparing Flexibility Solutions in District Heating Under Variable Operating Conditions

Integrated modeling and simulation are crucial for optimizing cities' energy planning. Existing sector-specific analyses have implementation limitations in representing interactions across infrastructures, limiting optimization potentials. An integrated framework simulating multiple interacting components from a systemic perspective could reveal efficiency gains, flexibility, and synergies across urban energy networks to guide sustainable energy transitions. Co-simulation approaches are gaining attention for analyzing complex interconnected systems like District Heating (DH). Traditional single-discipline models present limitations in fully representing the interconnectivity between district heating networks and related subsystems such as those in buildings and energy generation. Therefore, we propose a co-simulation based framework to simulate DH system behavior while easily integrating models of other subsystems and Functional Mock-up Unit (FMU) simulators. We tested this Plug&Play modular framework for Demand Side Management (DSM) and Storage-based strategies, evaluating their effectiveness in peak reduction while lowering the temperatures of the network.