An electricity price and energy-efficient workflow scheduling in geographically distributed cloud data centers

Abstract

The cloud computing platform has become a favorable destination for running cloud workflow applications. However, they are primarily complicated and require intensive computing. Task scheduling in cloud environments, when formulated as an optimization problem, is proven to be NP-hard. Thus, efficient task scheduling plays a decisive role in minimizing energy costs. Electricity prices fluctuate depending on the vending company, time, and location. Therefore, optimizing energy costs has become a serious issue that one must consider when building workflow applications scheduling across geographically distributed cloud data centers (GD-CDCs). To tackle this issue, we have suggested a dual optimization approach called electricity price and energy-efficient (EPEE) workflow scheduling algorithm that simultaneously considers energy efficiency and fluctuating electricity prices across GD-CDCs, aims to reach the minimum electricity costs of workflow applications under the deadline constraints. This novel integration of dynamic voltage and frequency scaling (DVFS) with energy and electricity price optimization is unique compared to existing methods. Moreover, our EPEE approach, which includes task prioritization, deadline partitioning, data center selection based on energy efficiency and price diversity, and dynamic task scheduling, provides a comprehensive solution that significantly reduces electricity costs and enhances resource utilization. In addition, the inclusion of both generated and original data transmission times further differentiates our approach, offering a more realistic and practical solution for cloud service providers (CSPs). The experimental results reveal that the EPEE model produces better success rates to meet task deadlines, maximize resource utilization, cost and energy efficiencies in comparison to adapted state-of-the-art algorithms for similar problems.