Facing the internal requirements of high-quality economic development in China, gas enterprises must carry out digital transformation, intelligent development and smart development. In order to further analyze the current situation, challenge and development direction of smart gas in China, this paper systematically studies and analyzes smart gas from the aspects of concept and development status, domestic key problems, architecture design, implementation paths and application scenarios. And the following research results are obtained. First, smart gas is vertically a six-level application architecture composed of perception layer, network layer, data layer, support layer, application layer and decision-making layer. Second, the construction content horizontally consists of five businesses, i.e., intelligent operation of urban gas, intelligent operation of LNG plant and terminal, smart operation of branch pipeline, intelligent operation of CNG/LNG filling network and intelligent coordination of gas supply chain. Third, there are four challenges in the process of its application, including perception capability construction of production unit, sufficient integration and intelligent fusion of data, collaborative operation and innovative value increase, and technological iteration and pilot promotion. In conclusion, smart gas is a huge systematical science engineering, whose realization needs an integration of cloud computing, big data, Internet of things, artificial intelligence, computer simulation, block chain and information security, through reasonable planning, reliable technical support, step-by-step operation process and continuous optimization and improvement. © 2021, Natural Gas Industry Journal Agency. All right reserved.
