---
title: "Open energy system models"
chunk: 13/16
source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_energy_system_models"
category: "reference"
tags: "science, encyclopedia"
date_saved: "2026-05-05T03:49:30.157219+00:00"
instance: "kb-cron"
---

A key paper describing OSeMOSYS is available. A 2011 study uses OSeMOSYS to investigate the role of household investment decisions. A 2012 study extends OSeMOSYS to capture the salient features of a smart grid. The paper explains how to model variability in generation, flexible demand, and grid storage and how these impact on the stability of the grid. OSeMOSYS has been applied to village systems. A 2015 paper compares the merits of stand-alone, mini-grid, and grid electrification for rural areas in Timor-Leste under differing levels of access. In a 2016 study, OSeMOSYS is modified to take into account realistic consumer behavior. Another 2016 study uses OSeMOSYS to build a local multi-regional energy system model of the Lombardy region in Italy. One of the aims of the exercise was to encourage citizens to participate in the energy planning process. Preliminary results indicate that this was successful and that open modeling is needed to properly include both the technological dynamics and the non-technological issues. A 2017 paper covering Alberta, Canada factors in the risk of overrunning specified emissions targets because of technological uncertainty. Among other results, the paper finds that solar and wind technologies are built out seven and five years earlier respectively when emissions risks are included. Another 2017 paper analyses the electricity system in Cyprus and finds that, after European Union environmental regulations are applied post-2020, a switch from oil-fired to natural gas generation is indicated.
OSeMOSYS has been used to construct wide-area electricity models for Africa, comprising 45 countries and South America, comprising 13 countries. It has also been used to support United Nations' regional climate, land, energy, and water strategies (CLEWS) for the Sava river basin, central Europe, the Syr Darya river basin, eastern Europe, and Mauritius. Models have previously been built for the Baltic States, Bolivia, Nicaragua, Sweden, and Tanzania. A 2021 paper summarizes recent applications and also details various versions, forks, and local enhancements related to the OSeMOSYS codebase. An electricity sector analysis for Bangladesh completed in 2021 concluded that solar power is economically competitive under every investigated scenario. A 2022 study looked at the effects of a changing climate on the Ethiopian power system. OSeMOSYS has also been applied variously in Zimbabwe  and Ecuador. Another 2022 study examined water usage, split by withdraws and consumption, for several low carbon energy strategies for Africa. Another study that year examined renewable energy in Egypt. And another the Dominican Republic. The Italian island of Pantelleria was used as a case study to compare battery and hydrogen storage and found that a hybrid system was least cost.
In 2016, work started on a browser-based interface to OSeMOSYS, known as the Model Management Infrastructure (MoManI). Led by the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA), MoManI is being trialled in selected countries. The interface can be used to construct models, visualize results, and develop better scenarios. Atlantis is the name of a fictional country case-study for training purposes. A simplified GUI interface named clicSAND and utilizing Excel and Access was released in March 2021. A CLI workflow tool named otoole bundles several dedicated utilities, including one that can convert between OKI frictionless data and GNU MathProg data formats. In 2022, the project released starter kits for modeling selected countries in Africa, East Asia, and South America.

  
The OSeMBE reference model covering western and central Europe was announced on 27 April 2018. The model uses the MathProg implementation of OSeMOSYS but requires a small patch first. The model, funded as part of Horizon 2020 and falling under work package WP7 of the REEEM project, will be used to help stakeholders engage with a range of sustainable energy futures for Europe. The REEEM project runs from early-2016 until mid-2020.
A 2021 paper reviews the OSeMOSYS community, its composition, and its governance activities. And also describes the use of OSeMOSYS in education and for building analytical capacity within developing countries.

==== OSeMOSYS Global project ====
The OSeMOSYS community launched the OSeMOSYS Global project in 2022 to create a global model and associated workflows. As of late‑2022, OSeMOSYS Global is limited in scope to the electricity sector and the world system provided comprises 164 countries separated by 265 nodes.

=== PyPSA ===

PyPSA stands for Python for Power System Analysis. PyPSA is a free software toolbox for simulating and optimizing electric power systems and allied sectors. It supports conventional generation, variable wind and solar generation, electricity storage, coupling to the natural gas, hydrogen, heat, and transport sectors, and hybrid alternating and direct current networks. Moreover, PyPSA is designed to scale well. The project is managed by the Institute for Automation and Applied Informatics (IAI), Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT), Karlsruhe, Germany, although the project itself exists independently under its own name and accounts. The project maintains a website and runs an email list. PyPSA itself is written in Python and uses the linopy library. The source code is hosted on GitHub and is also released periodically as a PyPI package.