Energy Informatics Research Articles

Energy informatics: Fundamentals and standardization

Abstract Based on international standardization and power utility practices, this paper presents a preliminary and systematic study on the field of energy informatics and analyzes boundary expansion of information and energy system, and the convergence of energy system and ICT. A comprehensive introduction of the fundamentals and standardization of energy informatics is provided, and several key open issues are identified.

Recent trends in energy informatics research

Recent trends in energy informatics research

Design Challenges and Opportunities for Eco-Feedback in the Home

Domestic energy conservation is critical to reducing energy demand and greenhouse gas emissions. Personal visualization has a role to play in the design of appropriate feedback for encouraging more effective home energy use, but the unique nature of residential energy informatics introduces new design issues. This article reviews current approaches and discusses unaddressed challenges related to better conceptual models, context, enhanced communicative scope, and functional aesthetics. Based on a proposed theoretical framework, the author identifies important gaps in the current design space of residential energy visualizations related to richer data models, a broader concept of context, an enhanced communicative scope, and a better ecological fit in the home.

Editorial for the third D-A-CH conference on energy informatics

The geopolitical dependency on oil and gas, looming threats of climate change, social and environmental costs of mining, or the prospect to address business opportunities in a large and growingmarket—there aremany reasons to redress our fossil-based energy systems. In fact, energy topics have become a top priority of our society, and decision makers around the world have committed themselves to ambitious development targets towards a sustainable energy supply and use. To attain this goal, two dominant, complementary paths are treaded: the expansion of renewable energy sources and improvements in energy efficiency across all sectors. Both

Managing Information Rights to Develop the Energy Informatics Field

Data-mining can use pattern and cluster analysis in regulated domains to discover important relationships, anomalies and dependencies. Information sciences promise to enrich the emerging field of “energy informatics.” Law both constrains and enables analysis of energy exploration, production, refining and distribution data, promising market efficiencies and environmental quality. This paper explores the management of information governance to enhance access to energy-related data repositories: reservoir geophysical, commodity/financial markets, leasing, land rights, environmental, refinery characteristics, pipelines, supply chain, critical infrastructure, fuel chemistry, and GIS. Provisional relationships are developed among these data sets using open and proprietary sources to enhance energy sustainability and economic security.

Using calibrated energy models for building commissioning and load prediction

This research article presents the development and demonstration of a monitoring based commissioning system for commercial buildings. An energy model of an educational building located on the campus of the University of Colorado Boulder was developed and was calibrated to conform to ASHRAE Guideline 14 using hourly measured data. A Latin Hypercube Monte Carlo (LHMC) sampling algorithm was used to obtain a set of plausible solutions by varying each key building parameter. A regional sensitivity analysis was then used to identify the parameters that had the greatest impact on the model's energy performance using a Goodness of Fit (GOF) metric. The calibrated model is used to compare actual building energy use to modeled energy use over various time scales. Deviations in consumption beyond adjustable predefined thresholds are detected as discrete events using a commercially available energy informatics system, while relative deviations against the model are quantified and visualized using a custom energy management application providing insight on model-to-actual deviations over daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly and annual time horizons. Finally, utilizing weather and solar radiation forecasts, the effectiveness of said energy model in a predictive context was investigated, allowing operators to receive 24–48-h predictions of energy consumption and demand by end use as well as forecasts of building variables such as zone temperatures. The model based commissioning system successfully predicted energy and demand in terms of magnitude and timing and correctly forecasted cooling capacity shortfalls.

Energy informatics for behavioral change

Behavior change has been identified as an important determinant to curb energy consumption. In this context, information and communication technology (ICT) and especially feedback instruments can provide a significant contribution by motivating behavior change on a large scale. Yet, related smart meter pilot projects often fail to produce the hoped-for energy saving effects--mostly as they fall short in motivating an initial adaption and recurrent usage of the technology. In order to overcome this problem, we describe and empirically test a scalable and cost efficient solution that uses elements from behavioral sciences to motivate people to initially adapt and continuously use the technology provided. The approach draws on social normative feedback and externally emitted incentives. In the energy informatics domain, there is a big gap in the understanding of the effects of these elements, which is crucial to improve the overall effectiveness of programs. Therefore, we empirically investigate how these mechanisms motivate initial participation in an ICT based program to reduce in-home energy consumption. We conducted our study in a real world setting with a sample of 17,500 customers of a Swiss utility. Our findings show that participation heavily depends on the motivational mechanisms used. Therewith, targeted messages could enhance program participation rates by up to 45 % and dramatically increase the overall impact with no additional costs.

The Role of a Sustainability Informatics Framework in Transportation Systems

This article develops a Sustainability Informatics Framework, a framework that connects Information Technology with sustainability and is based on the Belief-Action-Outcome and Energy Informatics frameworks. The triple-bottom line (People, Planet, and Profit) is adopted as a criterion for measuring sustainability and three sustainability indices are first formulated and then visualized using Sustainability Dashboards. This framework is then used to analyze transportation systems. This leads to the development of research propositions that can expand the role of the Information Systems discipline to research on areas of sustainable nation building.

Green IS

While in the past information technology was mostly seen as a contributor to environmental degradation, recent studies suggest that information systems (IS) can indeed enable sustainable processes, products, and services. Specifically, information systems are expected to create an impact on individual beliefs about environmental sustainability, enable more sustainable work practices through virtualization and remote work, enable organizations to meet compliance imperatives and social norms, or increase resource efficiency. In this context, notions such as energy informatics or green business process management have emerged. The IS discipline is thus challenged to explore the potential of information systems to contribute to the betterment of the natural environment by enabling more sustainable work practices at individual, organizational, and societal levels. This special focus issue invites rigorous studies employing various research designs. The focus is on solution-oriented studies that show how the transformative power of IS can be leveraged in order to lessen our impact on the natural environment, which is under imminent pressure. Prospective studies thus range from the development and testing of new theory that explains how IS can support environmentally friendly behavior to design-oriented studies on the development of solutions for environmental sustainability. At this, we see one specific challenge in understanding how sustainability-related IS phenomena are different to “conventional” areas of investigation, typically focusing on mere economic imperatives including time, cost, and quality. Contributions from research and business practice on the following (and related) topics are invited: Information systems designs for sustainable work practices IT-enabled sustainability transformation The application of IS theories to sustainability-related phenomena Research methods for the investigation of sustainability-related phenomena Information systems and beliefs about environmental sustainability Supply chain management and sustainability Business intelligence and performance management for sustainability Systems approaches towards ITenabled environmental sustainability Sustainability solutions Energy informatics Green business process management 2 Submission

Energy and utility management maturity model for sustainable manufacturing process

The manufacturing industry, one of the top consumers of natural resources, produces extensive carbon emissions that create the need for a sustainable manufacturing process, a topic of significant research interest. In the recent decades, the advancement of environmental technology and introduction of comprehensive environmental management systems have highlighted the intangible benefits of environmental management practices and their potential to drive organizational competitiveness. Accumulating evidence on the potential benefits of environmental protectionism has given rise to a series of environmental management practices and systems, such as energy informatics, environmental management standardization frameworks, and green supplier management and collaboration. However, existing literature lacks a clear conceptualization and a coherent theoretical framework of environmental management. In addition, no systematic framework exists for the design and implementation of environmental management practices that guide organizations in deciding on the practices or systems that they should implement given their organizational situations. Thus, this study aims to develop an energy and utility maturity framework for systematic measurement and management of natural resource consumption. Specifically, the proposed framework, energy and utility management maturity model (EUMMM), was designed based on the capability maturity model integration (CMMI). EUMMM has two major functions. First, it provides an assessment framework for analyzing the maturity level of energy and utility management in organizations. Second, it provides a progressive framework to guide organizational advancement in energy and utility management. A collaborative pilot study was conducted to validate the effectiveness, practicability, and convenience of the EUMMM. The results indicated that EUMMM successfully led the participating companies to move along the environmental management maturity path. Theoretically, this study extends the application of CMMI to the context of natural resource management and develops a progressive framework for energy and utility management maturation. Practically, this study provides a robust guideline for practitioners in analyzing and advancing energy and utility maturity levels to achieve a sustainable manufacturing process.

A new paradigm for the design and management of building systems

Leveraging the emerging technologies of Energy Informatics and cross-reality, a new concept is proposed for how buildings and their systems are designed and operated. The basic premise of Energy Informatics contends that information has the power to reduce energy consumption, which, in a simple fashion, is asserted as “Energy+Information=Less Energy”. The concept of informatics can be applied to energy issues in the built environment from scales ranging from individual pieces of equipment (such as with fault detection and diagnostics) up to regional or country level (such as with a smart electrical grid). Facilities Management and Modeling (FMM) is introduced as a new form of information systems to apply the principles of Energy Informatics to increasing energy efficiency in building operations. There are three core principles that guide the design of FMM: measurement, modeling, and management. The characteristics and use of FMM are discussed. Also introduced are potential applications for how cross-realty concepts can be applied in the training of students and professionals in the operation of complex building systems.

Information Systems and Environmentally Sustainable Development: Energy Informatics and New Directions for the IS Community

While many corporations and Information Systems units recognize that environmental sustainability is an urgent problem to address, the IS academic community has been slow to acknowledge the problem and take action. We propose ways for the IS community to engage in the development of environmentally sustainable business practices. Specifically, as IS researchers, educators, journal editors, and association leaders, we need to demonstrate how the transformative power of IS can be leveraged to create an ecologically sustainable society. In this Issues and Opinions piece, we advocate a research agenda to establish a new subfield of energy informatics, which applies information systems thinking and skills to increase energy efficiency. We also articulate how IS scholars can incorporate environmental sustainability as an underlying foundation in their teaching, and how IS leaders can embrace environmental sustainability in their core principles and foster changes that reduce the environmental impact of our community.

Orthogonalized correlation–distribution method for acquiring power offer and demand in energy informatics

Groups of decentral power systems are usually managed in an integrated way to keep efforts reasonable. For fluctuating power offer and demand, i.e., their time series of monitoring data, a generic description is proposed based on decoupled modelling of correlation and distribution functions. Distributed monitoring databases together with standardized evaluation tools give a broad representation of operation experience for the variety of dispersed power supplies, e.g., by normalized yields of irradiation reference and load. They allow for supply quality management, system design, comparison and continuous improvements.