Welcome to SAInt Docs

1. What is SAInt?

The Scenario Analysis Interface for Energy Systems (SAInt) is a software platform designed to model integrated energy networks and markets. SAInt allows modeling energy markets, electricity networks, gas networks, coupled electric and gas networks, and thermal networks.

2. Components of SAInt Docs

A key component of SAInt is its continuously expanding documentation ecosystem. The user is guided in the learning process of energy systems model development with an in-depth description of SAInt functionalities and practical and concise how-to guides. Tutorials and learning more cases further support the user in realizing detailed studies and answering cutting-edge questions. SAInt documentation takes advantage of the more modern web publishing frameworks to create a dynamic and modern experience aimed to answer your modeling questions quickly and efficiently.

The documentation ecosystem of SAInt is built around four main components.

Component What’s Inside What You Get

Installation Guide

Description of how to request, install and manage SAInt

Instructions on registering, downloading and installing SAInt, activating and managing licenses, and troubleshooting common problems.

Technical Specifications

Description of SAInt and services

An overview of SAInt’s architecture, model and scenario structures, customer support and services, and software installation and management.

Reference

Description of the software components

Shows all the information there is to know about SAInt: capabilities, settings, dependencies, etc.

How-To Guides

Step-by-step instructions

Instructions on completing common tasks and solving common problems.

Tutorials

Learning by doing

Guides in the creation and execution of a project. Shows real examples of applications using the software.

Learn More

Discussions on particular topics

Explains and discusses particular topics. It broaden the knowledge and dives into the mathematical equations.

pySAInt Manual

Manual for the data management tool pySAInt

Describes how to use the core functionalities of pySAInt and how to perform Capacity Expansion Model (CEM) operations using pySAInt.

3. What’s New

SAInt release 3.7 introduces new and exciting features and enhancements. Please take some time to get acquainted with such changes. You can find a summary in the table below. Some of the changes may have an impact on your models.

  • Components, Tools, Support

    • Multi-purpose Data Plugin support is introduced in SAInt. Several data plugins will soon be introduced that support particular workflows (e.g., contingency analysis) and data translations from various formats.

    • Connectivity check in unbalanced multi phase electricity networks is introduced.

    • The examples and description of API functions are revised.

    • Offline SAInt documentation application will no longer be supported or shipped with SAInt releases.

  • UX/UI & Performance

    • Tools section that contains Data Plugins and Connectivity Check is added in the Ribbon.

    • The Node Bar component is enhanced with customizable default display properties for inputs and results; navigation between nodes is enabled.

    • Multi-purpose Info (string) and Constant (numerical) properties are added to every network object.

    • New event and default event properties are introduced to enable users to specify a soft limit (penalty price) for the lower and upper bound of a custom electric constraint.

    • The ability to specify a linear cost rate for branch flows to help represent hurdle rates/wheeling charges between adjacent nodes/zones/regions is introduced.

    • The LinearSolverEngine property is introduced in the Scenario interface. Users can now select from different linear solvers that offer performance improvements depending on the network characteristics.

    • The self-identity keyword for the network objects is converted from “@” to “this” and the keyword is preserved instead of conversion to object IDs.

    • Performance of loading, unloading and running of scenarios; importing, adding and removing scenario events to scenarios have been enhanced.

    • Display DateTime setting is added in the Settings form in the GUI and new API endpoints are introduced for getting and setting the DateTime formats. The DateTime formats are applied within SAInt and while exporting data.

    • Dropdown selection and dropdown filter functionality for the collection type properties is added to the table.

    • Right click access for opening the collection editor is added to the collection items in the model explorer.

    • A new API endpoint (run*SIMNoSol) is added to enable running simulations without saving the results. This is particularly useful when running too many scenarios and querying results as it removes the I/O overhead.

    • New API endpoints (clear*SCE) are introduced for clearing all scenario events in the loaded scenario.

    • Target file options for exporting profiles are aligned with other components.

    • Clear validation warning messages are added in the property editor and object tables.

    • An option is added in the Script File context menu to enable the execution of IronPython scripts from the Project Explorer.

    • Supply Tracing functionality that enables displaying contribution of supplies to the demands is added for Steady State Gas scenarios.

    • Default plots for gas and thermal are improved.

    • Touchpad horizontal scroll support is added for tables.

    • Filters are applied to tables when opening them from the model explorer for collection items.

    • Map panning and zooming performances are improved.

    • ACOPF solution accuracy is improved in relation to the benchmark models.

    • Enabled execution of dynamic gas scenarios without an initial state.

    • Solver option to turn Gurobi log on/off is introduced.

    • The default value for PCOEFF (HGEN) and PGCOEFF + PDCOEFF (PHSTR) are changed to 1 instead of 0.

    • SolverModel property name has been changed to OptimizationProblemType and SolverType property has been changed to OptimizationSolverEngine.

    • Penalty price breakdown is added to the DCUCOPF logs. This will be extended to full objective function breakdown in the future.

    • The behavior of branch arrow changing direction based on the flow in the Node Bar when a scenario is loaded is changed to maintain the branch From/To direction.

    • The default directories such as “DataImport” folder are changed to default to the last used directory.

    • Close button is activated for Map sub-forms such as node bar or map selection filter to re-dock these components when they are in floating state.

    • Validity check for mol-faction range of gas mixture added for AGADC92 and GERG2008 equation of state.

    • QD and QG properties for nodes and containers have been changed from TotalReactivePowerDemand and TotalReactivePowerSupply to TotalReactivePowerByDemands and TotalReactivePowerByNonDemands, respectively.

    • The description for ValCurt property of Ancillary Service object is corrected.

    • The red border is added to the out-of-service branches in the Node Bar.

    • The Deviation and Time columns are hidden from the Profile table by default. These properties will be removed in the future and the UX for the Profile time handling will be improved by new features.

    • “Copy From Scenario” option is removed from the Scenario Window.

  • Security & Licensing

    • Codemeter version is updated to 8.30 and auto-update is added in the SAInt installer.

    • The issue with Codemeter runtime check that was causing processes stop and SAInt to crash due to network connectivity issues is resolved.

    • The issue with the Gurobi License check causing Missing Gurobi License exceptions is resolved.

  • Other Improvements

    • The issue of certain network properties (e.g. Info and RemoteName) are exported as '-' if empty (or undefined) is resolved.

    • The issue of importing multiple events overwrites existing events instead of adding new ones is resolved.

    • The issue of missing drop-down list in the WIND table is resolved.

    • The issue of specifying wrong Gurobi parameter resulting in OSError when using the API with Pythons is resolved.

    • The issue of any network object having a misleading description for the Name property is resolved.

    • The issue with PAVG event for electric demands caused by a conflict between PSET and PMIN/PMAX has been resolved.

    • The issue of changing the InitialState of a scenario to NONE from the GUI not updating the InitialState in the Status Bar is resolved.

    • The issue of changing the selected object causing the Property Editor View to reset to input properties is resolved.

    • The issue of not being able to deselect an object in the map after opening and closing a scenario is resolved.

    • The issue of inconsistent import behavior of CalcImp property for transformers is resolved.

    • The issue of ecount command throwing an error when counting a single object is resolved.

    • The issue of g* IronPython functions (gsum, gmean…) not being functional is resolved.

    • The issue of not being able to save a session is resolved.

    • The issue of network labels displaying error text is resolved.

    • The issue of displaying X coordinate in the labels instead of molar percentage is resolved.

    • The issue of panning functionality is not working in the map when the labels are not visible due to zoom level is resolved.

    • The issue of not being able to define negative values for PREF events is resolved.

    • The issue of not being able to import Synergi networks with CRS types is resolved.

    • The issue of not deleting the *MAP file while deleting a network from the project explorer is resolved.

    • The issue of exporting hidden columns while exporting a table to Excel resulting in compatibility warnings in Excel is resolved.

    • The issue of RATEDS property being not available in ACPF Scenarios is resolved.

    • The issue of LabelOriginLine not working for network labels is resolved.

    • The issue of context menu for SUBS and ZONES missing delete option is resolved.

    • The issue of KeepAspecRatio not being respected for labels is resolved.

    • The issue of networks being unnamed when the directory is a number is resolved. The naming constraint are relaxed.

    • The issue of copy&paste from the profile table not providing the correct time and dates is resolved.

    • The issue of missing default gas quality and gas components while importing gas network from excel is resolved.

    • The issue of unintentionally resetting the base map to the default provider when checkbox is deselected&selected is resolved.

    • The issue of not being able to map subs/zones with polygons from the Map with Polygon(s) options in the ribbon menu is resolved.

    • The issue of missing “Open Polygons Table” entry from context menu of Polygons is resolved.

    • The issue of missing save shortcuts not being displayed in the Quick Access Bar is resolved.

    • The issue of no warning if the results description file is open in Excel while exporting simulation results is resolved.

    • The issue of not showing the infinity value for the FAVG of the FUEL is resolved.

    • The issue of not being able to read a network/scenario/profile… file simultaneously from multiple processes is resolved.

    • The issue of resetting background color when base map is turned off and on is resolved.

    • The issue of NaN values causing the extents of the plots to scale with undesirable values is resolved.

    • The issue of PCOEFF, PGCOEFF, and PDCOEFF allowing negative values is resolved.

    • The issue of LI PMAXPRCREV is being used even if the REVON event is not included is resolved.

    • The issue of having inconsistency between the ENS value reported in the Log Window and the total PNS is resolved.

    • The issue of displaying incorrect/misleading log warnings for OFF events is resolved.

    • The issue of FuelPrice extension not being available for accessing the FuelPrice property of a FUEL is resolved.

    • The issue of branches with vertices and same FromNode and ToNode are failing the Shapefile import is resolved.

    • The issue of being unable to change the fill or line colors of polygons from the tables is resolved.

    • The issue of ACOPF simulation throwing an exception if transformer has finite Smax is resolved.

    • The issue of Unexpected active power behavior for prosumer is resolved.

    • The issue of 'time' command setting the time instead of incrementing it is resolved.

    • The issue of polygon file availability being wrongly reported in Project Explorer and deleted file being displayed is resolved.

    • The issue of Zone / Sub default plots not being displayed in the Chart window is resolved.

    • The issue of lacking diagnostic detail in 'No pivot element found.' error while trying to utilize a SparseLU solver is resolved.

    • The issue of Progress Bar not reflecting the progress correctly while importing scenario events is resolved.

    • The issue of displaying an exception when right clicking on the map after deleting multiple object labels is resolved.

    • The issue of not being able to delete or revert direction of branches from table is resolved.

    • The issue of displaying RemoteName property for GasResistor and GasValve in the table is resolved.

    • The issue of selecting multiple nodes in the map not multi-selecting the objects in the property editor is resolved.

    • The issue of displaying different values for the same queries with different time units is resolved.

    • The issue of being able to set the value of ObjPerPageNodeBar as 0, causing an exception is resolved.

    • The issue of custom node size values not being properly translated in the Node Legend when the log mod is active is resolved.

    • The issue of out of service demands and generators being considered for PGSET and PDSET on container level is resolved.

    • The issue of treating DateTime properties as string when exporting to Excel files is fixed.

    • The issue of not having performance improvement in map drawing when a layer is disabled is resolved.

You can check the full list of changes in the release notes available on the the community Forum download page (https://forum.encoord.com/c/release) .

4. How to Search Titles and Text

To search titles and text in SAInt Docs, type the words in the top-right search box. The section titles containing any of those word are found at first, then the search is performed on the text. By default, the search only applies to the current component. Uncheck the box in this component, to enable searching on all the components. Use any of these five advanced searching techniques to customize your search:

(1) Any word will be reduced to its stem. For example, to search "objects" is the same as to search "object".

(2) To find sections whose titles contain "network", type:

title:network

(3) To perform a logical AND search, like "foo AND bar", prefix both words with +:

+foo +bar

This can also be combined with the second technique:

+title:network +gas

(4) Similarly, to exclude a word, prefix it with -:

+foo bar -baz

(5) The wildcard (*) is supported. For example, to search any word with an "oo"-ending:

*oo