Building Management with Mjölnir

We recently announced the release of the stable version 0.2 of our open source energy management system Mjölnir at http://mjoelnir.sourceforge.net.

While the tool targeted so far mostly "disaggregated" device-level energy and power usage, we have now introduced full support for circuit-level measurements (buildings, rooms) which unlocks a considerable potential for further data analysis.

The DIN-RAIL module running the measurement system

As most of energy meters use the industrial automation system ModBus, we have been looking for possible shields to extend our open hardware solution with RS485 communication. We finally selected this RPi hat from Libelium while the meter is the Carlo Gavazzi EM24. The implementation is eased by the Libelium ArduPi library, which makes the C code written for Arduino compatible with the Raspberry Pi. The data is then being sent to our servers through a REST interface.

The overall component shown on the picture is therefore a low cost solution able to retrieve remote measurements via the RS485/ModBus and the USB/ZigBee network. This opens for the future integration of other measurement units, such as water and gas meters.

The support of circuit-level measurements required changes on the Mjölnir system.

The system is now organised in buildings, rooms and devices. A circuit is described by its ID and can be associated to a single building or room.
As usual, the code of the gateway is available on SourceForge, along with the dashboard system.

Bibliography:

1. A. Monacchi, F. Versolatto, M. Herold, D. Egarter, A. M. Tonello, and W. Elmenreich. An open solution to provide personalized feedback for building energy management. ArXiv preprint arXiv:1505.01311, 2015.

Research Scholarship in the Field of Energy Management and Technology

The scholarship will support a scientific project to be done at the Alpen-Adria-Universität Klagenfurt (for example as part of a dissertation).

Applicants must

• have a completed master or diploma degree
• Austrian citizenship or analogous according to § 4 StudFG (EU citizenship)
• the average monthly additional income during the scholarship may not exceed the amount of € 679, - (net)
• not have at an active employment contract with Alpen-Adria-Universität Klagenfurt during the scholarship
• target a scientific project within the topics of the research cluster energy management and technology (e.g., smart grids) to be done at the Alpen-Adria-Universität Klagenfurt

How to apply

submit a single PDF document no later than August 16 2015 to wilfried.elmenreich@aau.at with

• project description (English, max. 3 pages)
• research methodology
• time plan
• CV publication list
• Support letter from supervisor
• Leaving certificate of the respective field of study (eg Master certificate)
• Proof of citizenship
• Affidavit that the specified income level is not exceeded

For detailed information, visit https://energy.aau.at/

MJÖLNIR - The Open Source Energy Advisor

The interface 0.2

We are glad to announce the stable release 0.2 of our open source energy management system at http://mjoelnir.sourceforge.net.

Mjölnir provides an open platform where different energy consumption  feedback mechanisms can be implemented and assessed.

The system is one outcome of the MONERGY project, an Interreg research project that explores the use of home energy management systems to foster alteration of consumption patterns and achieve better utilisation of local energy sources. In particular,  we addressed residential settings in Carinthia (Austria) and Friuli-Venezia Giulia (Italy).

We identified common electrical devices and analysed the penetration of renewable energy [1], as well as user's attitude towards smart homes [2]. A measurement campaign was then carried out in 8 selected households, to track power consumption of individual loads at 1Hz for over 1 year. Main outcome was the GREEND dataset [3], openly available here. 

The energy advisor widget

The dataset was then analysed to gain further insights into energy consumption behaviour in the regions [4]. In particular, policies were formulated to improve energy efficiency, namely: i) shedding of standby losses, ii) postponement to off-peak periods, iii) replacement with more efficient appliances, and iv) operation curtailment.

An estimation of benefits yield by those policies was computed using data from the GREEND dataset, which showed a potential of up to 34% of savings. However, while these policies have a general validity, their benefits can be extended to a larger area by exploiting the functionalities of the Mjölnir framework. To this end, we implemented an energy advisor widget which displays the list of advices and allows users for acceptance and rejection. Each candidate advice is computed based on actual device usage events and energy costs, while a limited number of advices is returned based on user's preferences [5].

The MJÖLNIR system is part of a larger solution consisting of:

• an aggregate power meter, measuring active power, such as the YOMO open hardware meter [6]
• an appliance-level monitoring system, such as the OpenEnergyMonitor [7], or a load disaggregation unit [8]
• the energy management system, consisting of a RESTful webservice and dashboard (Mjölnir) and a mobile application [9]

We expect the tool to be beneficial for both individuals and researchers carrying out field tests on persuasive technologies, whose contribution is particularly encouraged.

___________________________________

References:

1. A. Monacchi, W. Elmenreich, Salvatore D'alessandro, and A. Tonello. Strategies for domestic energy conservation in Carinthia and Friuli-Venezia Giulia. In Proceedings of the 39th Annual Conference of the IEEE Industrial Electronics Society (IECON 2013). IEEE, November 2013.
2. T. Khatib, A. Monacchi, W. Elmenreich, D. Egarter, S. D'Alessandro, and A. M. Tonello. European end-user’s level of energy consumption and attitude toward smart homes: A case study of residential sectors in Austria and Italy. Energy Technology & Policy, 1(1):97–105, 2014.
3. A. Monacchi, D. Egarter, W. Elmenreich, S. D'Alessandro, and A. M. Tonello. GREEND: An energy consumption dataset of households in italy and austria. In Proc. IEEE International Conference on Smart Grid Communications (SmartGridComm'14), Venice, Italy, 2014.
4. WiTiKee and Lakeside Labs. Validation and analysis of results. Monergy 4th project deliverable, 2015.
5. A. Monacchi, F. Versolatto, M. Herold, D. Egarter, A. M. Tonello, and W. Elmenreich. An open solution to provide personalized feedback for building energy management. ArXiv preprint arXiv:1505.01311, 2015.
6. C. Klemenjak, D. Egarter, and W. Elmenreich. YOMO - The arduino based smart metering board. In Proc. Energieinformatik, Zurich, Switzerland, 2014.
7. OpenEnergyMonitor http://openenergymonitor.org/emon/
8. D. Egarter, V. P. Bhuvana, and W. Elmenreich. PALDi: Online load disaggregation via particle filtering. IEEE Transactions on Instrumentation and Measurement, pages 1–11, 2014.
9. A. Monacchi and W. Elmenreich. Insert-coin: turning the household into a prepaid billing system. In Poster Abstract, 5th ACM Workshop On Embedded Systems For Energy-Efficient Buildings. ACM, November 2013.

European NILM workshop 2015 in London

I'm really happy to here that there will be a Second European Workshop on Non-intrusive Load Monitoring this summer.
The event was announced from Oliver Parson, an organizer of the Workshop, as follows:

I'm really excited to announce that the Second European Workshop on Non-intrusive Load Monitoring will be held on 8th July 2015 at Imperial College London. The workshop is the follow up to last year's NILM @ London workshop, which provided the first European venue which brought together both academics and companies with an interest in energy disaggregation. Updates and registration information can be found at the new website: www.nilm.eu

Some important information:

When: 8th July 2015
Where: Imperial College London, UK
Cost: Free
Objective: To provide a European venue for disaggregation researchers to discuss recent developments in the field and fuel future collaborations

This workshop will have a more technical focus than the first workshop, and will feature a keynote from Mario Bergés in the morning and a technical session of invited talks in the afternoon. Furthermore, we're inviting all attendees to bring a poster on a topic of their choice, which could be a recent piece of work, their company's current direction, or even an invitation for collaboration on a joint project. Last, we're hoping to live stream the event online for anyone who can't be there in person, though this is a little experimental!

For more information please visit www.nilm.eu!

Call for Papers Conference on Innovative Smart Grids Technologies Latin American

October 5-6-7, 2015

Hotel Radisson Montevideo, Uruguay

isgtla.org

chairs@isgtla.org

Radisson Montevideo (CC-BY-3.0 Rodrigo uy)

The IEEE PES Conference on Innovative SMART GRID Technologies (ISGT-LA 2015) Latin American, sponsored by the IEEE Power & Energy Society (PES) and hosted by IEEE URUGUAY SECTION and PES local CHAPTER, will be held on OCT 5, 6 and 7th, 2015.

The Conference will be a forum for the participants to discuss state-of-the-art innovations in Smart Grid technologies, to attend tutorials and Industry Panels.

Conference TOPICS are:

- Renewable Energy Sources and Smart Grid (Hydro, Tidal, Wind, Solar and Electric Vehicles, Storage technologies), Wind Integration, Resources forecast (water, wind, weather), Environmental Impacts and Climate change mitigation,

- Energy and Distribution Management Systems, Wide Area Monitoring, Control and Operation (SCADA Systems), Call Center solutions for Smart Grid

- Computational methods and optimization techniques in Smart Grids; Big Data, Massive Grid Data, Data Mining of Smart Grid, Geographic information system (GIS) technology and Smart Grid, Multi-agent Based Applications for Smart Grids

- Smart Grid Impact on Electric Power Systems (Generation, Transmission and Distribution), Grid modeling, analysis and simulation, real time and co-simulation, Stability

- Demand Response, Demand side management, Customer aspects, user behavior and Flexible Demand,

- Smart Grids Information and Communications Technologies (I.C.T): Communications, System Architecture, Operations Support System (OSS), WANs and LANs Networks, 3G/4G networking. Control and Information Systems: Cyber Security Systems, Intelligent Monitoring and Outage Management

- Power System Instrumentation and Measurements, Metering Infrastructure and Instrumentation, Smart Meters, Components Reliability and Diagnostics, System and Components Asset Management

- Power Quality, Energy Efficiency and Smart Grid, Power Electronics Devices: modeling, application, control. FACTS: flexible alternating current transmission system power electronics and Smart Grid

- Protection in Energy Systems, PMUs and Wide Area Monitoring, IEC 61850, distributed IEDs, Synchrophasors in Distribution

- Smart Grids Interoperability, Regulation and Policies, Codes, Standards, Public Policies for implementation of Smart Grids, Testing and certification

-Integration of Distributed Energy Resources, Distributed Generation Islanded Systems and Microgrids: operation, control, monitoring and technologies, Low-voltage direct current (LVDC) distribution networks

- Home and Building Automation, Smart Cities, Cross Energy-domain solutions, Smart Sensors, Convergence of Smart Grid and the Internet of Things,

- Smart Grid Projects, Field Tests, large-scale demonstrations and deployment experiences, Future trends: technologies, researches, standards, incentives, opportunities

- Smart Grid Agenda; Smart Grid Roadmaps, Smart Grid Infrastructure Investments, Planning and Budgets, Cost and Benefits Analysis, Grant Programs,

- Smart Grids and Electricity Markets, Economics and incentive Regulations for Smart Grids, Impact of Smart Grids in Regulation and Energy Pricing, Smart Grids and Sustainable Developement,

- Smart Grid Utility Assets; Smart Grid Assets Management, urban enviroment, self-healing techniques, underground grids, Smart Wires, GIS for Smar Grid,Substation Equipment and Smart Grids; Transformers, Circuit Breakers, Switches

ISGT-LA Sample Papers;

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5mRMHjp1zrIa0NiTlVmZDJva0k/view?usp=sharing

Important Dates:

March 15, 2015 EXTENDED ABSTRACT Submission Deadline
June 15, 2015 Notification of paper ACCEPTANCE
August 15, 2015 Camera-ready / FINAL PAPER Submission Deadline
October 5-6-7, 2015 Conference at Radisson Montevideo Hotel

Evolving a Self-organizing Energy Market for Microgrids

Graphical user interface of the FREVO plugin

Andrea Monacchi and Wilfried Elmenreich went to Zurich to present their paper about a home energy market simulator at Energieinformatik '2014.
In the presented work, self-organizing behavior between prosumers is implemented at device level via market-based energy allocation solutions. The approach is implemented in a simulator extension to the open framework FREVO, which is released for open use. With the help of FREVO, artificial neural network controllers for energy prosumers are designed using an evolutionary algorithm. Minimizing individual and overall running costs enables a better use of local energy production from renewable sources, while considering residents' necessities to minimize discomfort.

• Andrea Monacchi, Sergii Zhevzhyk, Wilfried Elmenreich. HEMS: A Home Energy Market Simulator. Energieinformatik. Zurich, November 2014.

HEMS: A Home Energy Market Simulator from Andrea Monacchi

Call for Papers of the Fourth IFIP Conference on Sustainable Internet and ICT for Sustainability

CALL FOR PAPERS

SustainIT 2015

Fourth IFIP Conference on Sustainable Internet and ICT for Sustainability

 2015, Madrid, Spain

http://www.networks.imdea.org/sustainit2015/index.html

All papers presented at SustainIT 2015 will be published in the IEEE Xplore Digital Library. The best paper presented at the conference will receive a Best Paper Award.

Authors of papers of particular merit will be invited to submit an extended version of their work to the Elsevier Journal of Computer Communications Journal (COMCOM).

SCOPE AND OVERVIEW

The evolving information and communications (ICT) technologies present a unique opportunity to effect the transformation needed to move us towards the goal of sustainability by helping to reduce our carbon footprint, mitigate and adapt ill effects of climate change, reduce and repair environmental damage, provide effective disaster response and recovery, creatively manage overstressed infrastructures in crowded urban systems, and enhance use of planet friendly materials and technologies. ICT is already being integrated into many areas of our lives, such as smart management of city services, transportation, energy distribution and management, health care, etc., and this integration is expected to expand deeper and wider in the coming years and decades. Unfortunately, this ICT proliferation brings in its own challenges of increased carbon footprint, accelerating obsolescence of electronic equipment and its disposal issues, increased use of precious natural resources such as water and materials, etc. These twin problems of reducing the environmental impact of ICT and exploiting ICT for a more sustainable world form the underlying theme for SustainIT since its inception in 2010.

This year's SustainIT continues this theme by focusing on inter-disciplinary scientific challenges of enhancing the sustainability of ICT and via ICT. The goal of this conference is to bring together people from different research areas, and provide a forum to exchange ideas, discuss solutions, and share experiences among researchers, professionals, and application developers from both industry and academia.

Original papers addressing both theoretical and practical aspects of sustainability of ICT (including smart energy management) and innovative use of ICT to enhance human and societal sustainability are solicited.

TOPICS OF INTEREST include but are not limited to:

1) Sustainable communication substrates:
Energy-efficient networking technologies and architectures
Energy-efficient wired and wireless communications protocols
Cross-layer optimizations for sustainable networking
Novel standards and metrics for green communications

2) Energy-efficient operation of computing infrastructure:
Energy-efficient management of computing, storage, and network resources
Managing carbon footprint of data centers and increasing its energy efficiency
Algorithms to reduce the energy consumption of ICT infrastructure
Trade-offs between energy efficiency, Quality of Service, and reliability
Adaptation of computing and communications infrastructure to variable renewable energy supply
Emerging computing/storage technologies for energy efficient operation

3) Achieving sustainability through the application of ICT:
Application of ICT to increase the energy efficiency of smart homes, smart buildings, and smart cities
ICT for sustainable mobility, transport, and logistics
ICT for energy-efficient industrial environments and processes
ICT for smart power grids and novel data processing in smart energy systems
ICT for water distribution systems including leaks, theft, contamination, and attacks.
ICT for agriculture, food distribution/logistics, waste reduction, tracking/provenance, etc.
ICT for healthcare (health monitoring & healthy lifestyle support systems, disease detection/monitoring, assistive technologies, health care information systems, etc.)
ICT for underwater (e.g., oceanic) monitoring and communications
ICT for waste water and waste monitoring, handling and reduction
ICT in disaster monitoring, rescue and recovery, including emergency networking and exploitation of social media
ICT for monitoring and conservation of biodiversity
ICT for geohazard monitoring (e.g., landslides, earthquakes, etc.)
Crowdsourcing solutions for sustainability
Urban Sustainability

4) Practical issues in sustainable communication systems
Security and privacy in ICT applications for sustainability
Energy consumption measurements, models, and monitoring tools
Measurement and evaluation of the Internet's sustainability
Test-bed and prototype implementations of sustainable ICT systems

5) Science of Sustainability
Metrics for sustainability and their evaluation
Modeling of human behavior regarding sustainability choices (e.g., reduction in energy consumption, engagement of power management features, etc.)
Ecosystem modeling (perturbations and equilibria)

PAPER SUBMISSION

All submissions must describe original research, not published or currently under review for another workshop, conference, or journal. Manuscripts must be limited to 8 pages and must strictly adhere to the IEEE conference publication format (e.g., 10pt font, single spacing, double column) in US Letter size with all fonts embedded. Detailed instructions for manuscript preparation and submission are available on theconference website.

Papers must be submitted electronically in PDF format through EDAS.

Submission implies the willingness of at least one author to register and attend the conference to present the paper. The organizers reserve the right to exclude a paper from distribution after the conference if the paper is not presented at the conference.