OwlSim: Revolutionizing National Energy Policies Through Technology

COMP 410 in Collaboration with Citizens for Affordable Energy

Overview

• Introduction - Robert– COMP 410– Project Motivation– Problem Statement

• Simulation Framework - James• Energy Model and Plans - Irina• Demo - Jesus• Conclusion - Robert• Questions - Various

INTRODUCTION

COMP 410

• Format

Project Motivation

• No national energy policy• We want to simulate the trends of the existing

energy system and plans for the future in order to provide the citizens of 2060 with affordable energy and fuel

Problem Statement

• Create a non-partisan plan for the U.S. energy system for the next 50 years

• Develop a simulation framework– Flexible – able to simulate wide variety of models– Scalable – able to simulate models of different size

• Create and simulate a model of the U.S. energy system using simulation framework

• Make the plan, model, results accessible to public

SIMULATION FRAMEWORK

Design

• Runs on Microsoft’s Azure cloud platform– Virtually unlimited computing capabilities– System resources scale with demand– Pay as you go– Links web services with powerful backend

• Module-based modeling– Encapsulate components of model– Allows composite modules with other modules

inside

Capabilities

• Supports many simultaneous users• Scales with load• Basic use case– View model, plan, precomputed results

• Authenticated use case– Edit plan, recompute results, save results

• Expert Authenticated use case (if working)• System Administration use case (if working)– Publish results (if working)

ENERGY MODEL AND PLANS

High-Level Model

Worst-Case Plan

Average-Case Plan

Best-Case Plan

Comparison with Other Models

DEMO

Demo

• Connecting through web• Explain GUI• Basic use case– View model, plan, precomputed results

• Authenticated use case– Edit plan, recompute results, save results

• Expert Authenticated use case (if working)• System Administration use case (if working)– Publish results (if working)

CONCLUSION

Acknowledgements

• Citizens for Affordable Energy, John Hofmeister, Karen Hofmeister

• People we consulted for help• Microsoft for sponsorship• Steven Wong, Scott Rixner• TAs• Team leads and all our hard-working students

QUESTIONS

Questions

• Can’t this be done in Excel?– Yes, simple test model could be done in Excel, but professionals

could develop more complicated models. Excel doesn’t have centralized mechanism for managing results. Visualizing model, others can edit, maintainability, portability. Results is not only objective – also export.

• How can you develop model without domain knowledge?– Talked to experts, used recognized resources (EIA etc.). Simple

but reasonable model.• How did you choose Azure over other clouds?

– Had past support from Microsoft

Questions

• What was biggest technical challenge?• What was biggest non-technical challenge?• HTML5, other technology choices• Did you use curve fitting on historical data?

BACKUP

References

• EIA etc.