Dear Colleagues,

The energy system we know today is expected to undergo a massive transformation in the upcoming decade. The development is driven by the wish of many decision makers to reduce the dependency on oil and gas and to cut the emission of greenhouse gases, and it is fuelled by the advent of renewable energy sources and the availability of cost-effective, sophisticated communication and control systems. Within the electricity sector, the transformation is especially pronounced due to the large number of new, distributed generation systems, the necessity to continuously balance supply and demand, and the new role of the consumer who can also feed in electricity from PV-installations or combined heat and power systems.

Smart Meters play a vital role to cope with the growing complexity of the electrical grid. The meters measure and communicate consumption data at a high resolution in time, provide information on the status of the grid, and, depending on the system design, can operate load switches. This rather limited set of functions renders possible a plethora of applications and services, including advanced load shifting programs (via dynamic tariffs or direct control of appliances), energy saving campaigns (by making electricity use “visible” and, thus, more salient to consumers), fine-grained monitoring of the distribution grid, more efficient business processes for billing, changing providers, and flexible tariff plans, and the integration of consumers into the grid that also feed in electricity. Future applications may arise in the field of consumption data analytics (e.g., for marketing purposes or for more powerful saving campaigns), home automation (e.g., by using consumption data for advanced control), and mobility (e.g., by integrating (hybrid) electric vehicles into the grid).

However, at the same time, Smart Meters pose a number of challenges to researchers and practitioners. This Special Issue invites articles that address these challenges, as well as new developments related to Smart Meters and their application, including, but not limited to, the following fields:

• Energy Networks: Techniques to deal with stochastic energy sources, integration of distributed power and storage systems (including e-mobility), ICT for grid management and control, smart metering infrastructures, and sensor networks.
• Buildings: Integration of building automation and heating systems in energy networks, applications of smart metering and feedback technologies.
• Cross-Sectionals: Techniques to protect critical energy infrastructure and consumer privacy, interoperability, analytics for energy data, information systems that aim at motivating/supporting sustainable consumer behavior, simulation, modeling, and business process innovation in the related domains.

Prof. Dr. Thorsten Staake
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

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Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Energies is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• demand response management
• network integration of distributed power and storage systems
• network integration of plug in hybrids and electric vehicles
• Interoperability and security of grid components
• feedback technologies for behavior change
• ICT-based energy services
• impact assessments