Practical Mathematical Modeling for Simulation, Estimation, and Optimal Control of Gas Pipeline Systems (Zlotnik, Los Alamos)
Practical Mathematical Modeling for Simulation, Estimation, and Optimal Control of Gas Pipeline Systems
Speaker: Dr. Anatoly Zlotnik
Affiliation: Los Alamos National Laboratory, USA
Abstract: Natural gas transportation by pipeline has grown throughout the world in magnitude and variability, particularly to fuel electricity production. The need for responsive and reliable pipeline operations has compelled renewed interest in the mathematics and engineering of gas transport. A grand challenge goal is an integrated optimization of markets, flow scheduling, and operations to provide decision support for intra-day gas pipeline management. Such a system would solve a constrained moving horizon model-predictive optimal control problem that accounts for compressible flows through large-scale pipeline networks with time-varying injections, withdrawals, and control actions of compressors and regulators. The objective is to maximize economic surplus for pipeline system users by transporting gas from suppliers to locations with the greatest need, while meeting all physical and engineering constraints under transient conditions. Tractable modeling of components and network topologies; scalability, speed, and accuracy of computations; and data assimilation of state estimates and forecasts in industrial systems present ongoing challenges. This presentation reviews recent work and ongoing developments in formulating simulation, estimation, and optimization problems for gas transmission pipelines, and the modeling, algorithms, and computational methods being developed to apply these methods in practice.