Optimal transport on gas networks

Abstract Optimal transport tasks naturally arise in gas networks, which include a variety of constraints such as physical plausibility of the transport and the avoidance of extreme pressure fluctuations. To define feasible optimal transport plans, we utilize a $p$ -Wasserstein metric and similar dynamic formulations minimizing the kinetic energy necessary for moving gas through the network, which we combine with suitable versions of Kirchhoff’s law as the coupling condition at nodes. In contrast to existing literature, we especially focus on the non-standard case $p \neq 2$ to derive an overdamped isothermal model for gases through $p$ -Wasserstein gradient flows in order to uncover and analyze underlying dynamics. We introduce different options for modelling the gas network as an oriented graph including the possibility to store gas at interior vertices and to put in or take out gas at boundary vertices.