Decision Support Systems for Energy Production Optimization and Network Design in District Heating Applications

This chapter focuses on the application of Operations Research approaches to energy distribution and production. As to the energy distribution, we consider the strategic problem of optimally expanding a district heating network to maximize the net present value. As to the energy production, the problem we consider is at a tactical level and concerns the definition of the best unit commitment plan to maximize the profit of the plant. The chapter presents two decision support systems designed to address the above mentioned problems and discusses their use in real-world applications.