Conference article

Homes in today’s world tend to include more and more electrically powered devices. Much effort is put on improving these facilities; but their integration towards a smart home often remains unconsidered. While there are some promising approaches to integrate devices with the help of knowledge bases; they are still not fully convincing. In all cases they fail to cover the energy behavior of installed devices which is a severe shortcoming with respect to the increasing energy demand of a home. As most residents are still unaware where the energy is consumed and which actions eventually lead to a lower demand; an energy related knowledge representation is of importance. This paper proposes such an energy knowledge base modeled as ontology. This artifact comprises a comprehensive collection of miscellaneous energy related information and allows home automation systems to make intelligent decisions upon this knowledge. Using the ontology; energy consumption in the home itself can now be optimized by executing intelligent control strategies that incorporate and exploit the additional knowledge in their algorithms. Likewise; also renewable energy suppliers are represented and may be considered by a smart home system in order to reduce the overall ecological footprint of the residents and provide additional services for home control.

Energy Parameters; Smart Homes; Ontologies