Engineering energy services of the future by means of Dynamic Energy Control Protocols (DECPs)

In this paper we conjecture that revolutionary advances in future energy services are needed and that these are only possible by means of information technology (IT). To support this claim, we first briefly describe the fundamental needs for changing the ways energy services have been provided, and possible consequences resulting from not adopting qualitatively new paradigms. We next make the case why managing energy services of the future to meet such needs will only be possible when pursuing a systematic deployment of IT-based mechanisms for processing, delivering and consuming energy. We stress open R&D questions to which basic answers are needed in order to rip benefits of IT. Notably, a multi-disciplinary approach to modeling and simulating a cyber-physical system (CPS) comprising the physical energy grids, and its support communications, sensing, and computing cyber layers is essential. Designing regulatory policies for facilitating penetration of IT at the value is also viewed as one of the key R&D challenges. Finally, we introduce our vision of an IT-framework in support of dynamic energy control protocols (DECPs) and illustrate potential benefits from implementing DECPs.