Components

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Components of an Energy System

The components represent individual constituents of the energy system, e.g., individual technical plant parts, material models, demands, and tariffs. The user arranges the components on the Scheme, connects them to networks and parameterizes them in the forms. You can add certain component elements, such as operating constraints, costs and revenues, and requirements, using the component ribbon of the active component or directly in the input data form. Some components are not networked, these include the key figures and components for time series functions.

The component templates for the individual components are stored in the Component Template Library.

Instances of a Component

Each component that occurs in the project is represented in the Component Library.

To duplicate a component on the scheme, drag it while holding down the control key. The copy of the component is stored as a new component with its own name in the Component library. The advantage is that all values are copied from the original component and can then be changed independently of the original component.

A component can appear in several schemes of a project and be parameterized differently there in each case. Components with the same name can have different local values or the same global values for the same identifiers. Components with the same name can only exist in different schemes as different instances of a component. There may not be several components with the same name (more than one instance of a component) within one scheme:

There must not be more than one instance of a component in each scheme. If you want to add a second similar component you have to create a new instance with its own name (see the Drag-and-Drop below). The following video illustrates this with an example.

Video

Components in the Project Explorer

The components are arranged alphabetically in the project tree of the Project explorer under their parent node.

To get the form view of a component in the work area on the right, click with the left mouse button on the component in the project tree below the Scheme node (not in the Component Library).

Right-click on the component in the project tree to open the context menu with the following options:

Anytime you Rename components, all instances of the component throughout the project and in the component library are simultaneously renamed.

No non-Latin characters, such as Cyrillic letters or Chinese characters, may be used for the name of the component. If a component has been renamed in violation of this rule, it automatically gets its original name back. The component name must also not contain any of the following characters: . \ / : * ? “ < > | % # ² ³ € µ. Otherwise, renaming will be blocked, and a warning will appear.

You can Export a component to import it later into other projects.
By default, a component template with the extension e-cmp is saved in the folder
C:\Users\$username$\Documents\TOP-Energy\My Components.
In the export dialog you can also choose any other location.

A local component is the instance of the component within a scheme. The function Delete local component removes the selected component only within the scheme and not all representatives of the component in the entire project, as the following function does.

The function Delete all representatives of that component removes the global instance of the component. It deletes also all local representatives of the selected component in the entire project, including the Component Library of the Project explorer.

Drag-and-Drop

New local instances of a component can be created by drag-and-drop in the following four different ways:

Drag the component template from the Component Template Library to the Scheme node in the Project explorer,
Drag the component template from the Component Template Library to the work surface of the scheme,
Copy the component on the work surface of the scheme while holding down the <Ctrl> key, or
Drag the component in the Project explorer to a Scheme node or to the scheme of another variant.

If a local instance of the component already exists in the target scheme (in the third case, always), a new global instance is created in the first three cases. This instance is then automatically given a name affix in the form of a number to distinguish it from the component with the same name. In the fourth case, the warning appears instead:
The component cannot be assigned to the target. There may already be a component of the same name (…) in the component library. Please use or delete it.

Therefore, the fourth method is only suitable if there is no component with the same name in the scheme.

A component can be dragged and dropped from project tree into My Components folder or another custom folder in the Component template library to export it as e-cmp file.

Ribbons and Forms of the Components

The ribbon for components is introduced in the article Component Ribbon.

The typical form structure of components is presented in the article on structure of forms.

You will learn how to add, rename, and remove component parts in a separate article.

Under the Notes and tooltip tab, you can configure the tooltips and select special Developer options for some components (e.g., steam turbine, condensate pump, electricity tariff).

Exporting Components

In addition to the opportunity to export components as e-cmp files described in Drag-and-Drop, you can also export a component via its context menu in the Project explorer or on the scheme. In this way, each component can be saved at a location of your choice as a file with the extension e-cmp and can later be used as a template in other projects. To do this, select Export component in the context menu of the component in the Project explorer or on the scheme.

To use the saved component template in another TOP-Energy project, add the folder in which the component template is saved to the Component template library as a new directory. From there, the component template can be dragged to the scheme or to the Project explorer.

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