ICT Technologies, Techniques and Applications to Improve Energy Efficiency in Smart Buildings

Currently, most of the human activities impact the environment. Worldwide sustainable development is required to preserve a good quality of life. Energy efficiency is one of the most relevant issues that the scientific community and society must face along the next decades. This paper focuses on reviewing and noting the main factors which impact the optimization of electrical energy efficiency in Smart Buildings, including distribution, consumption analysis, strategies and management. Smart grids and smart buildings are playing a key role in the definition of the following generations of cities where the impact of energy consumption on the environment must be reduced as much as possible. Notwithstanding, all the factors impacting the production and distribution must be also taken into consideration by energy production companies and distribution companies as well. Green energies are being introduced in smart cities and buildings, only slower than required, and in general, focusing on the consumption side asking for higher performance monitoring and control techniques, and encouraging to incorporate energy harvesting initiatives to improve the overall efficiency. In this paper, the major target is pointing out all the relevant factors influencing smart building energy efficiency, up to the consumer side and, at the same time, paying attention on distribution and generation issues and, specifically, available communication standards, technologies, techniques, algorithms, which enable high performance systems to optimize energy consumption and occupant comfort.