Papers for
energy forecasting teams
Papers whose findings have a practical use for this group, as judged from the abstract. Open a paper to read what it means in practice.
Graph neural networks show limited edge benefits in load forecasting
A Diagnostic Protocol for GNNs in Electricity Load Forecasting: Separating Parameter Sharing from Neighborhood Access
Abstract: A graph neural network (GNN) forecasting a collection of load series combines two mechanisms, sharing parameters across series and reading neighboring series, and a gain over a non-graph model may come from either; telling them apart decides whether a graph is worth maintaining. We propose a model diagnostic protocol that compares the GNN with three reference models: a per-node network, a network shared across nodes without neighbors, and the same GNN without edges. Degree-preserving rewiring tests whether neighbor identity matters. After a tuned benchmark on regional load in France and on low-voltage feeders in the UK, we apply the protocol to deliberately short node histories, as when non-stationary demand leaves only recent observations relevant: the feeders, within one week, and a public dataset of client consumption series. On the feeders, sharing parameters recovers most of the error gap between node-specific models and GNNs, about two thirds against a regularized one. Adding the edges to an otherwise identical backbone brings a smaller gain, half or more of which disappears under rewiring. On the client series, the neighbor mean degrades the per-node model on the shorter window and the edges' gain is not consistently distinguishable from zero; on the regions of France, where each node's own history is already informative, the ranking between per-node models and GNNs changes with tuning. A synthetic study points to noisy local measurements as one regime where neighbors help. In an exploratory online aggregation, graph and non-graph forecasters appear complementary, and the weight assigned to GNNs is not proportional to their contribution. In none of the three datasets do the edges account for most of a GNN's advantage over node-specific models, so a forecasting gain should be credited to the graph only after comparison with per-node and shared references.
Graph toolbox simplifies building graph neural networks for electricity forecasting
GraphToolbox: A Configurable Python Framework for Graph Neural Network Forecasting
Abstract: Electricity forecasting often involves spatially related signals observed over regions, substations, and feeders, and Graph Neural Networks (GNNs) provide a natural way to represent these relations. Building a complete GNN forecasting experiment is nonetheless laborious, because graph construction, model selection, training, aggregation, and interpretation sit in incompatible tools. We present GraphToolbox, an open-source Python framework that unifies these stages in one configurationdriven pipeline built on PyTorch Geometric. It offers data-driven graph construction, an adapter that instantiates and trains 51 of the 65 PyTorch Geometric convolutions together with the recurrent cells of PyTorch Geometric Temporal, online expert aggregation, forecasting interpretability, and significance testing on cached forecasts. We evaluate the pipeline in two case studies. On French regional load, the 48 convolutions included in the complete forecasting sweep fall in a band from 1.14% to 1.60% error, online aggregation lowers this to 0.98%, and the graph models improve on classical additive and boosting baselines. On net-load, direct graph models are less accurate than a classical additive model, while forecasting each physical component separately improves them without closing that gap. Both comparisons use the same experimental interface, illustrating the role of GraphToolbox in systematic architectural evaluation.