Towards Efficient Energy Management: Defining HEMS and Smart Grid Objectives

Energy consumption has increased considerably in the last years. The way to reduce and make energy consumption more efficient has become of great interest for researchers. One of the research areas is the reduction of energy consumption in users’ residences. In order to reduce energy consumption in home environments, researches have been designing Home Energy Management Systems (HEMS). Efficiently managing and distributing electricity in the grid will also help to reduce the increase of energy consumption in the future. The power grid is evolving into the Smart Grid, which is being developed to distribute and produce electricity more efficiently. This paper presents the high level goals and requirements of HEMS and the Smart Grid. Additionally, it provides an overview on how Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) is involved in the Smart Grid and how they help to achieve the emerging functionalities that the Smart Grid can provide.