Calliope

Quick overview

Calliope is a free and open-source (Apache 2.0 licensed) tool that makes it easy to build energy system models at scales ranging from urban districts to entire continents.

Calliope is used extensively in research and commercial applications.
For a quick intro see “Why Calliope?” below and the quick start section on the support page.
See the installation instructions to get Calliope running on your computer.
Ask questions and discuss on our Gitter chat (see support page for more options).
Development takes place in the open on GitHub.

News

26 Mar 2025
Major new features: pre-release of version 0.7.0
18 Jan 2023
Release v0.6.10
30 Jun 2021
Release v0.6.7

Why Calliope?

Tried and tested in peer-reviewed publications

The Calliope code is tested with a comprehensive suite of automated software tests and has been used in a large range of peer-reviewed publications (see the list of publications).

Accelerate work by re-using existing models

For example, the fully open-source Sector-Coupled Euro-Calliope: a model of the entire European energy system built with Calliope.

Easy-to-use building blocks

Building a model is easy using Calliope's flexible text-based model definition format. The example shows the definition of a basic CCGT power plant. See example model tutorial.

ccgt:
    essentials:
        name: 'Combined Cycle Gas Power Plant'
        color: '#FDC97D'
        parent: 'supply'
        carrier_out: 'electricity'
    constraints:
        resource: inf
        energy_cap_max: 40000  # kW
        energy_ramping: 0.8
    costs:
        monetary:
            energy_cap: 750  # USD per kW
            om_con: 0.02  # USD per kWh

Interactive visualisations built-in

Calliope provides interactive visualisation of results from a model. Try it with the example shown, which includes three energy carriers: electricity, heat, and gas. Use the dropdown to switch between different views. See more visualisation capabilities.

Build on top of a free and open codebase

Calliope is completely freely and openly available under an Apache 2.0 license. By extensively using automated tests, it provides a solid foundation on which to build transparent and reproducible energy system models. Development happens in the open on GitHub.