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Outputs

When the simulation is done, you can view the different outputs generated by Antares Simulator.

These results follow a precise structure. They are presented by year or presented aggregated accross all the simulated scenarios.

Note

The mean and standard deviation are computed taking into account the weights indicated in the scenario playlist.

Then, they are grouped by:

  • area
  • link
  • binding constraint

Moreover, for an area you can view the different results for each cluster of:

  • thermal
  • storage
  • renewable

Note

Long-term storage objects such as Hydro are inside the area results as there is only one per area.

Finally for each of the latter result, you can choose to view your results at a given time step:

  • hourly
  • daily
  • weekly
  • monthly
  • annually

Additionnally, an aggregated summary of the results is proposed for the whole grid.

General output file structure

For each simulation, Antares Simulator generates an output folder such as output/<output_id>. Inside, there are notably information about the study, about the execution of the simulation... Whether you chose an economy or adequacy simulation, you will have a folder with the most important results of your simulation. First, the folders:

  • mc-all/ contain synthetic results over all years
  • mc-ind/ contain results for a single year attached to an ID.

Then, on picking areas, binding constraints or link (or grid for a global view of the network), the user gets direct access to all data regarding these objects.

[adequacy | economy]
├── mc-ind 
|   └── <mc_year_id> 
|       ├── areas
|       ├── binding_constraints
|       └── links
└── mc-all 
    ├── areas
    ├── binding_constraints
    ├── grid
    └── links

By area

In the areas/<area_id> folder, there are 25 files resulting from the combination of the following attributes: [values | id | details | details-res | details-STstorage] × [hourly | daily | weekly | monthly | annual].

  • The second attribute defines the time span over which the results are assessed: hourly detail, daily bundle, weekly bundle, monthly bundle, annual bundle.

  • The first attribute defines the nature of the results presented in the file :

    • values Values of different variables (marginal price, load, loss of load duration), the list of which is common to all areas of the interconnected system. Files of type "values" have therefore the same size for all areas. These results appear under the label General values in the output Antares Web.

    • details Values regarding the different dispatchable thermal generating plants of each area (e.g. "older 300 MW coal from the south coast"). The sizes of these files differ from one area to another. These results appear under the label Thermal plants in Antares Web.

    • details-res Values regarding the different renewable clusters of each area. The sizes of these files differ from one area to another. These results appear under the label Ren. clusters in the Antares Web.

    • details-STstorage Values regarding the different short-term storages of each area. The sizes of these files differ from one area to another. These results appear under the label ST storages in the output GUI.

    • id Identifier (number) of the Monte-Carlo years for which were observed the extreme values of the different variables presented in the values files. These results appear under the label Record years in Antares Web.

The area files that belong to the General values class display fields corresponding to the expectation, standard deviation, minimal and maximal values of the variables whose list is given hereafter.

General data

OV. COST (Euro)

The overall cost corresponds to the sum of the operating cost, unsupplied cost, spilled cost, and hydro cost.

OV. COST CSR (Euro)

Same as the overall cost, but with CSR (curtailment sharing rule) unsupplied cost version2.

OP. COST (Euro)

The operating cost corresponds to the sum of proportional costs and non-proportional costs.

MRG. PRICE (Euro)

Locational marginal price corresponding to the overall economic effect of a local 1MW load increase.

MRG. PRICE CSR (Euro)

BALANCE (MWh)

Overall import/export balance of the area (positive value: export).

ROW BAL. (MWh)

Rest of the worl balance, that is to say import/export with areas outside the modeled system (positive value: import)1.

UNSP. ENRG (MWh)

Unsupplied energy: adequacy indicator (Expected Energy Not Served–EENS).

UNSP. ENRG. CSR (MWh)

Unsupplied energy after CSR (demand that cannot be satisfied)2.

DENS (MWh)

Introduced in v8.3. Domestic Energy Not Supplied: the difference between the local production capabilities of an area and its local load2.

LMR. VIOL

Introduced in v8.5 Local Matching Rule Violation after the Antares Simulation as defined by the adequacy patch2.

SPIL. ENRG

Introduced in v8.5 Spilled energy (energy produced that cannot be used and has to be wasted).

LOLD (h)

Loss of load duration: adequacy indicator (length of shortfalls).

LOLD CSR (h)

Loss of load duration, CSR (Curtailment Sharing) version: same as above, but based on unsupplied energy CSR (see UNSP. ENRG. CSR) rather than UNSP. ENRG2

LOLP (%)

The loss of load probability is an adequacy indicator corresponding to the probability of at least one hour of shortfall within the considered period, without normalization by the duration of the considered period.

LOLP CSR (%)

Loss of Load probability, CSR (Curtailment Sharing) version: same as above, but based on unsupplied energy CSR (see UNSP. ENRG. CSR) rather than UNSP. ENRG2.

AVL DTG (MWh)

Available dispatchable thermal generation (sum of available power over all plants).

DTG MRG (MWh)

Disp. Ther. Gen. (AVL DTG – sum of all dispatched thermal generation)

DTG MRG CSR (MWh)

DTG MRG after CSR2.

MAX. MRG (MWh)

Maximum margin: operational margin obtained if the hydro storage energy of the week were used to maximise margins instead of minimizing costs.

MAX. MRG CSR (MWh)

Thermal objects

DISPATCH. GEN. (MWh)

Dispatchable generation for thermal clusters.

DTG by plant (MWh)

Dispatchable thermal generation for any active thermal cluster that is to say its production.

MIN DTG by plant (MWh)

For any active thermal cluster, minimum between:

  • the cluster production
  • the product of the minimum generation modulation, the number of units and the nominal capacity associated to the cluster

CO2, NH3, SO2... EMIS. (Tons)

Introduced in v8.6. Amount emitted by all dispatchable thermal plants for polluants: CO2, SO2, NH3, NOX, PM2_5, PM5, PM10, NMVOC, OP1, OP2, OP3, OP4, OP5 EMIS.

NODU

Number of Dispatched Units aggregated accross all clusters.

Note

NODU and NP Cost do not appear in "Adequacy" results since these variables are irrelevant in that context.

NODU by plant

Number of dispatchable units by plant.

PROFIT by plant

Introduced in v8.3.

Net profit of the cluster in euros5:

(MRG. PRICE - marginal cost of the cluster) × (dispatchable production of the cluster)

PSP (MWh)

User-defined settings for pumping and subsequent generating.

MISC. NDG (MWh)

Miscellaneous non-dispatchable generation.

LOAD (MWh)

Demand (including DSM potential if relevant).

RES LOAD (MWh)

Residual load, formula:

RES LOAD = load - allMustRunGeneration
         = load - (wind + solar + miscGen + ROR + mustRunSum)

where mustRunSum = total production of thermal clusters must-run and enabled.

NP COST (Euro)

Non-proportional costs of the dispatchable plants (start-up and fixed costs)

NP Cost by plant (Euro)

Same as above, but by dispatchable plant.

NPCAP HOURS (h)

Near price cap hours.

Renewable sources

RES generation by plant (MWh)

For any active renewable cluster, its production (necessarily must-run). Only when using clustered renewable generation modeling.

WIND (MWh)

Wind generation3.

SOLAR (MWh)

Solar generation3 (thermal and PV).

WIND OFFSHORE (MWh)

Introduced in v8.1 Wind offshore generation4.

WIND ONSHORE (MWh)

Introduced in v8.1 Wind onshore generation4.

SOLAR CONCRT. (MWh)

Introduced in v8.1 Concentrated solar thermal generation4.

SOLAR PV (MWh)

Introduced in v8.1 Solar photovoltaic generation4.

SOLAR ROOFT (MWh)

Introduced in v8.1 Rooftop solar generation4.

RENW. i (MWh)

Introduced in v8.1 Overall generation of other renewable clusters4.

Note

The index i can be either 1, 2, 3 or 4.

RENEWABLE GEN. (MWh)

Renewable generation (only when using clustered Renewable generation modeling).

Hydro object

H. STOR (MWh)

Power generated from energy storage units (typically: Hydro reservoir).

H. PUMP (MWh)

Power absorbed by energy storage units (typically: PSP pumps consumption).

H. LEV (MWh)

Energy level remaining in storage units (percentage of reservoir size).

H. INFL (MWh)

External input to the energy storage units (typically: natural inflows).

H. OVFL (%)

Wasted natural inflow overflowing from an already full energy storage unit.

H. VAL (Euro/MWh)

Marginal value of stored energy (typically: shadow water value).

H. COST (Euro)

Expenses/Income brought by energy storage actions (H.STOR, H.PUMP).

H. ROR (MWh)

Hydro generation, Run-of-river share.

Short-term storage

STS INJECTION by plant

Injection of energy from the area into each short-term storage group.

Warning

When the data is aggregated by a longer time scale than the hour for all year or by Monte-Carlo year, the aggregated value corresponds to the sum of the hourly values.

STS WITHDRAWAL by plant

Withdrawal of energy from each short-term storage group into the area.

Warning

When the data is aggregated by a longer time scale than the hour for all year or by Monte-Carlo year, the aggregated value corresponds to the sum of the hourly values.

STS LEVEL by plant

Level of each short-term storage group.

Warning

When the data is aggregated by a longer time scale than the hour for all year or by Monte-Carlo year, the aggregated value corresponds to the average of the hourly values. The only exception is when the data is aggregated by group and Monte-Carlo year, the data is the sum of the detailed results.

STS Cashflow by cluster (Euro)

Cashflow by short-term storage.

Note

In economy simulations, all variables have a techno-economic meaning. In adequacy simulation, only the adequacy indicators are: UNSP. ENRG, LOLD and LOLP.

Note

The net profit is computed on full precision values for MRG. PRICE. The user may obtain slightly different results applying the given formula because MRG. PRICE values are rounded to 10^-2.

In the links/<aream_from>/<area_to>/ folder, there are 10 files resulting from the combination of the following attributes: [values | id] × [hourly | daily | weekly | monthly | annual].

  • The second attribute defines the period of time over which the results are assessed: hourly detail, daily bundle, weekly bundle, monthly bundle, annual bundle.

  • The first attribute defines the nature of the results presented in the file.

    • values values of different variables (flow, congestion rent) the list of which is common to all interconnections. The files of type "values" have therefore the same size everywhere These results appear under the label "general values" in Antares Web.

    • id identifier (number) of the Monte-Carlo years for which were observed the extreme values of the different variables presented in the values files. These results appear under the label "record years" in Antares Web.

The area files that belong to the values class display 28 fields corresponding to the expectation, standard deviation, minimal and maximal values of the variables whose list is given hereafter.

FLOW LIN. (MWh)

Flow (signed + from upstream to downstream) assessed by the linear optimization. These flows follow Kirchhoff's law only if these laws have been explicitly enforced by suitable binding constraints.

UCAP LIN. (MWh)

Used capacity: absolute value of FLOW LIN. This indicator may be of interest to differentiate the behavior of interconnectors showing low average flows: in some cases, this may indicate that the line is little used, while in others, this may be the outcome of high symmetric flows.

LOOP FLOW (MWh)

Flow circulating through the grid when all areas have a zero import/export balance. This flow, due to the simplification of the real grid, is not subject to hurdle costs during the optimization.

FLOW QUAD. (MWh)

Flow computed anew, starting from the linear optimum, by minimizing a quadratic function equivalent to an amount of Joule losses, while staying within the transmission capacity limits. This calculation uses the impedances found in the "Links" input data. If congestions occur on the grid, these results are not equivalent to those of a DC load flow.

CONG. FEE (ALG.) (Euro)

Algebraic congestion rent = linear flow × (downstream price – upstream price).

CONG. FEE (ABS.) (Euro)

Absolute congestion rent = linear flow × abs(downstream price – upstream price).

MARG. COST (Euro/MW)

Decrease of the system's overall cost that would be brought by the optimal use of an additional 1 MW transmission capacity (in both directions).

CONG. PROB + (%)

Probability for the line to be congested in the upstream-downstream way.

Up>Dwn Congestion probability = (NC+) / (total number of MC years) with: NC+ = number of years during which the interconnection was congested in the Up>Dwn way for any length of time within the time frame relevant to the file.

CONG. PROB - (%)

Probability for the line to be congested in the downstream-upstream way.

Dwn>Up Congestion probability = (NC-) / (total number of MC years) with: NC- = number of years during which the interconnection was congested in the Dwn>Up way for any length of time within the time frame relevant to the file.

HURD. COST (Euro)

Contribution of the flows to the overall economic function through the "hurdle costs" component. For each hour:

if (FLOW LIN. – LOOP FLOW) > 0
    HURD. COST = (hourly direct hurdle cost) × (FLOW LIN.)
    else HURD. COST = (hourly indirect hurdle cost) × (-1) × (FLOW LIN.)

By binding constraint

The file is a matrix that provides the marginal cost associated with each binding constraint. Equality constraints are not included in this marginal cost calculation.

BC. MARG. COST (Euro)

Marginal cost for binding constraints.

For the whole grid

The folder contains multiple files:

  • The areas file provides the list of zones.
  • The thermal file contains the list of study clusters and their main characteristics.
  • The links file provides a list of study links.
  • The digest file offers an annual synthetic view, which corresponds to a concatenation of the values-annual files from the different nodes.

Time series draw numbers

Depending on the options chosen in the main simulation window, the output folders may also include the following section:

output/<simu_id>/ts-numbers/
├── load/
│   └── <area_name>/
├── thermal/
│   └── <area_name>/
├── hydro/
│   └── <area_name>/
├── wind/               # (1)!
│   └── <area_name>/
├── solar/              # (2)!
│   └── <area_name>/
├── renewables/         # (3)!
│   └── <area_name>/
└── ntc/
    └── <area_name>/
  1. Available only when renewable generation modelling is set to cluster
  2. Available only when renewable generation modelling is set to cluster
  3. Available only when renewable generation modelling is set to aggregated

These files contain, for each kind of time-series, the number drawn (randomly or not) in each Monte-Carlo year (files are present if "output profile / MC scenarios" was set to "true").

Time series generator files

Depending on the options chosen in the main simulation window, the output folders may also include the following section:

output/<simu_id>/ts-generator/
├── load/
│   └── <batch_number>/
│       └── <area_name>/
├── hydro/
│   └── <batch_number>/
│       └── <area_name>/
├── wind/               # (1)!
│   └── <batch_number>/
│       └── <area_name>/
└── solar/              # (2)!
    └── <batch_number>/
        └── <area_name>/
  1. Available only when renewable generation modelling is set to cluster
  2. Available only when renewable generation modelling is set to cluster

These files contain, for each kind of Antares-generated time-series, copies of the whole set of time-series generated. Batch numbers depend on the values set for the "refresh span" parameters of the stochastic generators (files are present if "store in output" was set to "true").

Miscellaneous

Alike input data, output results can be filtered so as to include only items that are associated with Areas and Links defined as "visible" in the current map. In addition, the output filtering dialog box makes it possible to filter according to two special categories (Districts and Unknown) that are not related to standard maps:

  • Districts displays only results obtained for spatial aggregates
  • Unknown displays only results attached to Areas or Links that no longer exist in the Input dataset (i.e. study has changed since the last simulation)

Annual system cost

In addition to the general output files, the output folder of each economic or adequacy simulation includes, at its root, a file Annual\_System\_Cost.txt. It presents the metrics of a global Monte-Carlo variable further denoted ASC.

The value of ASC for any given simulated year is defined as the sum, over all areas and links, of the annual values of the area-variable "OV.COST" and of the link-variable "HURD. COST".

The metrics displayed in the "Annual system cost" file take the form of four values:

  • Expectation EASC
  • Standard deviation SASC
  • Minimum LASC
  • Maximum UASC

As with all other random variables displayed in the Antares output section, the computed standard deviation of the variable can be used to give a measure of the confidence interval attached to the estimate of the expectation. For a number of Monte-Carlo years N, the law of large numbers states for instance that there is a 95 % probability for the actual expectation of ASC to lie within the interval:

\[ \texttt{EASC} \pm 1.96 \dfrac{\texttt{SASC}}{\sqrt{N}} \]

There is also a 99.8 % probability that it lies within the interval:

\[ \texttt{EASC} \pm 3 \dfrac{\texttt{SASC}}{\sqrt{N}} \]

Execution info

Each simulation produces a file execution_info.ini at the root of the output folder. This file contains information about the execution of the simulation, such as version of Antares used, options selected in generaldata.ini, information about the study (nb of areas...) and different steps duration.

The section [duration] contains the same fields as [duration_ms] with values in hours, minutes and seconds for longer studies.

The section [duration_ms] contains the following fields:

  • full_exec: total duration
  • loading: loading of all files
    • study_loading: loading of legacy solver files
    • modeler_loading: loading and parsing of files related to modeler: models, system, optim-config
  • simulation:
    • tsgen_thermal, tsgen_wind, tsgen_solar, tsgen_load, tsgen_hydro: if we need to generate time series for a type
    • mc_years: all monte-carlo years
    • hydro_ventilation: running hydro heuristics
    • problem_build_time: building of the optimization problem (legacy + modeler)
    • solve_time: solver resolution
    • export_simulation_tables: modeler related, creation and writing of simulation tables
    • post_processing: balance and flow quad
    • yby_export: export and writing of results for a year (year-by-year parameter)
    • synthesis_compute: results aggregation for mc-all
    • synthesis_export: export and writing of mc-all results
  • problem_build_time and solve_time are totals for each week of each year, more detailed values can be found in output folder: optimization/ week-by-week/year_n.txt

  1. Value identical to that defined under the same name in the "Misc Gen" input section. ↩

  2. Please note that this output variable is only available in the economy mode, if adequacy patch is activated and the area the output variable belongs to is inside the adequacy patch domain (see Adequacy Patch) ↩↩↩↩↩↩↩

  3. This output is only available if the parameter "renewable generation modelling" is set to "cluster" in the input of the simulation. ↩↩

  4. This output is only available if the parameter "renewable generation modelling" is set to "aggregated" in the input of the simulation. ↩↩↩↩↩↩

  5. dispatchable production = power generation above min gen = (power generation) - (min gen modulation) * num units * capacity ↩