Add fastexcel package for polars excel reading

Author: larsevj

pyproject.toml

@@ -37,7 +37,6 @@ dependencies = [
     "matplotlib",
     "netCDF4",
     "numpy<2",
-    "openpyxl",                                # extra dependency for pandas (excel)
     "opentelemetry-api<1.30.0",
     "opentelemetry-sdk<1.30.0",
     "opentelemetry-instrumentation-fastapi<0.51b0",
@@ -49,24 +48,25 @@ dependencies = [
     "pluggy>=1.3.0",
     "polars>=1",
     "psutil",
-    "pyarrow",                                 # extra dependency for pandas (parquet)
+    "pyarrow", # extra dependency for pandas (parquet)
     "pydantic > 2",
     "python-dateutil",
-    "python-multipart",                        # extra dependency for fastapi
+    "python-multipart", # extra dependency for fastapi
     "pyyaml",
     "pyzmq",
     "pyqt6",
     "requests",
     "resfo",
     "scipy >= 1.10.1, < 1.15",
     "seaborn",
-    "tables",                                  # extra dependency for pandas (hdf5)
+    "tables", # extra dependency for pandas (hdf5)
     "tabulate",
     "tqdm>=4.62.0",
     "typing_extensions>=4.5",
     "uvicorn >= 0.17.0",
     "xarray",
     "xtgeo >= 3.3.0",
+    "fastexcel>=0.12.1",
 ]
 
 [project.scripts]

src/ert/config/design_matrix.py

@@ -195,10 +195,12 @@ def read_design_matrix(
         ):
             error_msg = "\n".join(error_list)
             raise ValueError(f"Design matrix is not valid, error(s):\n{error_msg}")
-        design_matrix_df.columns = param_names
-        if "REAL" in design_matrix_df.columns:
+        design_matrix_df.columns = list(param_names)
+        if "REAL" in design_matrix_df.schema:
+            real_dt = design_matrix_df.schema.get("REAL")
+            assert real_dt is not None
             if (
-                not design_matrix_df.schema.get("REAL").is_integer()
+                not real_dt.is_integer()
                 or design_matrix_df.get_column("REAL").lt(0).any()
                 or design_matrix_df.get_column("REAL").is_duplicated().any()
             ):