Smart Grid (SG) concepts are rapidly being transferred to the market and huge investments have been made in renewable-based electricity generation and rolling out smart meters. However, the present state of the art does not ensure neither a good return of investment nor a sustainable and efficient power system. The work so far in the EU involves mainly larger stakeholders, namely power utilities and manufacturers more focused on production and grid resources.

BESOS proposes the development of an advanced, integrated, management system which enables energy efficiency in smart cities from a holistic perspective. To that end, the Energy Management Systems deployed in a typical district that are consuming or producing energy, and which nowadays normally count with an isolated IT management solution, will be able to share data and services through and open trustworthy platform among themselves and to external third party applications. This enables the design and development of higher level applications –i.e.

The ELECTRA Integrated Research Programme on Smart Grids (ELECTRA) brings together the partners of the EERA Joint Programme on Smart Grids (JP SG) to reinforce and accelerate Europe’s medium to long term research cooperation in this area and to drive a closer integration of the research programmes of the participating organisations and of the related national programmes. ELECTRA’s joint research activity and collaborative support actions build on an established track record of collaboration and engagement.

The route towards a more energy sustainable world goes through an improved energy system on all levels from the producers to the consumers. The technological challenges that need to be addressed to realize the strategic energy objectives are faced in the program Çcontrollable and intelligent power componentsÉ. The objective is to develop innovative power components with advanced control and monitoring that pave the path towards an optimum power transmission and distribution system.

The project, “Promotion of PV energy through net metering optimization” (PV?NET), is aimed at developing better energy policy for the promotion of renewable energies in the Mediterranean countries, targeting the best and most cost efficient use of PV technology. The focus is on the optimization of smart energy management systems in order to create alternative economic and sustainable measures through harmonization and reassessment of existing support schemes including government subsidies and grants.

The project aims to define, design, develop and implement intelligent control systems of energy that facilitate the management real-time of a microgrid of electric energy applied to an industrial area with high penetration rate of renewable energy, in order to change the concept 'pollutant' associated to industrial areas, by different another: 'ecological industrial areas capable of developing its own technology'.

The e-Highway2050 project is supported by the EU Seventh Framework Programme and is aimed at developing a methodology to support the planning of the Pan-European Transmission Network, focusing on 2020 to 2050, to ensure the reliable delivery of renewable electricity and pan-European market integration. The project will result in a modular development plan for possible electricity high- ways and options for a complete pan-European grid architecture, based on various future power system scenarios.

With the growing relevance of distributed renewable energy sources (DRES) in the generation mix and the increasingly pro-active demand for electricity, power systems and their mode of operation need to evolve.evolvDSO will define future roles of distribution system operators (DSOs) on the basis of scenarios which will be driven by different DRES penetration levels, various degrees of technological progress, and differing customer acceptance patterns.The evolvDSO consortium addresses the main research and technology gaps that need to be solved for DSOs to efficiently fulfil their emerging and f

Smart grids make current energy networks more intelligent and accessible; new ways of producing energy will soon make citizens not only energy users but also energy producers. The CIVIS project explores the potential of social networks and communities to significantly reduce energy use and carbon emissions.

The ORIGIN project's mission is to develop a sophisticated intelligent ICT system for the management of energy in a community, and associated business models, focussed on the concepts of aligning energy demand with the availability of renewables-based supply, addressing community goals for cost, carbon footprint and other objectives.