An Energy Ontology Focusing on Demand Side Management in Smart Homes

By increasing the share of renewable energy sources, the volatility of available energy is rising. More and more fluctuating power generation by solar power plants and wind turbines has to be integrated into the power grid. Demand side management (DSM) represents one possible solution to achieve this goal by including energy production and energy consumption simultaneously. In this paper, we especially focus on the field of electric energy in smart homes. Considering the implementation of different DSM devices, an ontology-based approach can serve as a conceptual foundation for a necessary knowledge base. We propose an advanced energy ontology for smart homes, integrating important aspects for a successful DSM. We describe how power producers, storages and consumers are represented in our ontology. Finally, we show the scenario-based utilization of our approach.