IEC CIM Based Ontology Definition for Gas Distribution Networks

The development of an integrated energy system requires information exchanges between different devices and actors, which can be facilitated by the creation of an interoperable system based on shared and standard data models. Within the broader scope of the digitalization of multi-energy networks, this paper focuses on the management of data and information related to different energy vectors using ontologies. In the electro-energy sector, IEC Common Information Model (CIM) represents the international standard to describe components of a power system and their relationships, while for other energy networks a reference and standard ontology is still in the phase of development. This paper introduces the definition of an ontology derived from IEC CIM for describing other energy networks, considering the example of gas distribution grids. The defined ontology is then exploited to describe the components of gas distribution networks managed by Unareti in Milan and Brescia. These networks are validated using the services provided by the Multi-Energy Semantic Platform (MESP), an open-source platform built on international standards designed for managing and analysing multi-energy networks. An advantage of modelling different energy networks using a similar data structure is related to the possibility of managing data of the new energy vector similarly to electrical networks. Moreover, this approach facilitates the combined and optimal management and analysis of multi-energy networks, thanks to the presence of a shared structure in the data model and the connection between different semantic databases.