SimCES platform for modular simulation: Featuring platform independence, container ecosystem, and development toolkit

Modular co-simulation contributes to both engineering and research, but the earlier solutions have lacked the combination of platform independence, loose coupling between the modules, and tools for straightforward development. This paper describes the simulation platform SimCES (Simulation Environment of Complex Energy System) that solves these issues with a microservice architecture, combining message-broker-based communication, containerization, and a development toolkit. The components can even communicate over Internet. Furthermore, there are developer tools that enable an easy start for developers with Python and Docker, but any external platform is possible too. SimCES is domain agnostic but stems from the energy domain.