NFDI4Energy

Transparency and Cooperation in Energy Systems Research

The energy transition and increasing sector coupling pose major challenges for energy system research. In this context, digitalization processes towards cyber-physical energy systems (CPES) facilitate change in many respects and have an equal impact on technical, social, and societal issues, but also on the research process itself. Research efforts on CPES rely heavily on model- and (co-)simulation-based approaches. The tracking of data and models represents a complex challenge that must be addressed anew in every research project.

NFDI4Energy aims to establish a joint research infrastructure for FAIR data, models, and processes, whereby results are to be made reproducible and transparent. In addition, society is to be involved in the identification and solution of relevant research questions and the transfer of knowledge between research institutions and commercial enterprises is to be promoted through FAIR research data management. Further goals are to simplify the integration and coordination of simulation-based models and to integrate the infrastructure provided for energy system research into the broader NFDI infrastructure.

The project enables and motivates the participation of society in the identification and solution of research questions and promotes better collaboration and knowledge transfer between scientific research institutions and business partners through FAIR research data management, considering the openness of data and software in task area 3, which is the focus of Fraunhofer FIT in NFDI4Energy.

Furthermore, it facilitates the search, identification, integration, and coordination of simulation-based models to address multidisciplinary research questions more efficiently. 

NFDI4Energy will establish a common research platform for FAIR data, models and processes in energy system research and motivate their use in the energy system research community. The project will enable traceability, reproducibility, and transparency of results for the scientific community and society, thus improving FAIRness in energy system research. In addition, NFDI4Energy integrates the services offered for energy system research into the broader NFDI ecosystem to improve cross-domain collaboration, for example by sharing higher-level ontologies and standardized metadata schemas.

Funding: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft

Partners:

Universität Oldenburg, Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg, Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, OFFIS, RWTH Aachen University, Fraunhofer FIT, Soziologisches Forschungsinstitut Göttingen (SOFI) e.V., Technische Informationsbibliothek, Reiner Lemoine Institute