Hitachi Energy’s Network Control platform is one of the most widely used power system planning and analysis tools in the energy industry. Utilities, grid planners, and market operators rely on Network Control to simulate electricity markets, evaluate transmission investments, and optimize power system operations.
To support increasingly complex energy systems, including renewable integration, market constraints, and large-scale transmission networks, Network Control integrates AMPL as its optimization modeling engine.
Today, Network Control powered by AMPL is deployed by more than 30 energy companies, supporting hundreds of analysts and planners managing some of the most complex power grids in the world.
Products Used
AMPL Modeling Engine
CPLEX for AMPL
Integrations
Embedded within Hitachi Energy: Network Control
C++ integration through AMPL APIs
Optimization Models
Unit Commitment
Network Flow Optimization
Industry
Energy / Power Grid Operations
Modern power systems are among the most complex operational infrastructures in the world. Grid operators must continuously balance electricity supply and demand while ensuring reliability across massive transmission networks.
Planning and operational decisions involve solving optimization problems such as unit commitment to determine which generation units should operate and when; network flow optimization to determine how electricity should move across transmission systems; transmission planning to evaluate grid expansion investments; and renewable integration to incorporate variable solar and wind generation.
These models must account for thousands of constraints including generator limits, fuel costs, market rules, transmission capacity, and reliable requirements.
Historically, optimization models embedded inside large software systems were implemented directly in languages like C++, making them difficult to maintain, extend, or customize for new market conditions.
Hitachi Energy needed a modeling environment that would allow them to develop and maintain large, complex optimization models efficiently, enable rapid model iteration and customization, and integrate optimization directly into the Network Control platform.
Hitachi Energy integrated AMPL as the optimization modeling engine inside Network Control, enabling the development of highly scalable and flexible power system models.
AMPL provides a high-level modeling language designed specifically for mathematical optimization. This allows developers and analysts to express complex decision models clearly and efficiently while separating model logic from the underlying application code.
Through AMPL’s C++ API, the optimization engine integrates directly into the Network Control software architecture, allowing Network Control to generate models dynamically and solve them using industry-leading MILP solvers.
This architecture provides several key advantages:
AMPL allows developers to build and modify complex optimization models far more efficiently than implementing them directly in general-purpose languages.
Because the model logic is clearly expressed in AMPL, customers and analysts can understand and adapt models for their own grid scenarios.
Using AMPL’s APIs, optimization models run directly inside Network Control while interacting with its simulation framework and datasets.
The Network Control optimization models built with AMPL include millions of variables and tens of thousands of integer decision variables, representing generation scheduling, transmission constraints, and market conditions.
Despite this scale, the system typically produces optimal solutions in approximately 10 minutes, enabling planners to evaluate multiple scenarios efficiently.
The integration of AMPL into Network Control has enabled the platform to become a widely adopted tool across the energy industry. Today the solution is used by more than 30 power companies, hundreds of analysts and planners, and organizations responsible for planning and operating major electricity grids.
As the power systems evolve with increased renewable generation, electrification, and market complexity, optimization models must adapt quickly.
AMPL provides the modeling flexibility required to extend Network Control’s capabilities while maintaining performance at scale.
→ 30+ energy companies using Network Control optimization models
→ Hundreds of power system analysts running optimization scenarios
→ Millions of variables solved in large-scale grid models
→ ~10 minute solve times for MILP models with tens of thousands of integer variables
Hitachi Energy’s Network Control platform demonstrates how AMPL can power large-scale optimization systems embedded inside enterprise software.
Access free licenses and explore production-grade optimization capabilities.
