Smart Applications for Smarter Energy Use in DIGITISE

In the DIGITISE project, Work Package 4 (WP4) led by University College Dublin, is dedicated to delivering practical, AI-driven tools that help prosumers understand and manage their energy use more effectively. These tools aim to enhance energy literacy, optimise consumption, and support more informed decisions around household energy investments and comfort. With direct connections to the data and analytics developed in other Work Packages, WP4 plays a crucial role in bringing the DIGITISE ecosystem to life.

Overview of WP4 and Its Main Activities

In this Work Package, we are developing a suite of applications adding to the quiver of tools prosumers have towards two goals: advancing their own energy literacy, which in turn also leads to maximizing their energy efficiency. To realize these goals, more specifically, we focus on implementing four applications: An “Energy Savings and Self Consumption Optimization Application”, an “Asset Sizing and Investment Optimization Application”, a “Health and Security Application”, and a “Consumer Application for Personalized Empowerment and Capacity Building”. The first three are adding to the core functionalities of DIGITISE while the last is effectively an end-user application that displays crucial information to the prosumers. In fact, through the last application, prosumers will be able to observe metrics related to the consumption and production of their unit and receive messages or alerts that will enable them to make decisions to improve not only their energy efficiency, but also other aspects of their lives.

Functionality of Each Application

First, the savings and optimization application will provide users with recommendations on adjustments the user can make to achieve better energy efficiency. Additionally, the second application will assist users wanting to achieve long-term financial benefits via proposing tailored possible unit renovations, either in the form of acquisition of new equipment (e.g., an EV asset) or substituting existing devices. Last, the health and security application will inform users regarding their current level of well-being and advise on how to better their living conditions, based on the users’ a-priori specified preferred levels.

Interconnections with Other Work Packages

To fully implement our four applications, we need to join forces with other Work Packages as well. First, there is a close relation between the AI Analytics that will be designed in WP3 and the first three applications, as input will be needed to generate the tailored recommendations. Furthermore, all the applications will source their input data from the DIGITISE data space which will also be delivered in WP3 and some will utilize other components from WP5.

Key Messages to Highlight

1. The applications developed in WP4 will empower prosumers to act towards tangibly bettering their energy consumption and living conditions.
2. The practicality and easy-to-use design will render deciding to take such actions an effortless process, blending seamlessly with other everyday activities and ultimately becoming a habit.
3. With quantifiable information, the users will be able to attain further financial benefits from possible energy investments they can make, based on their own asset and behavioral profiles.

Further Integration Across Work Packages

This Work Package functions as a standalone from the core implementation of the technical components’ perspective, however requires the assistance of other work packages to fully evaluate its functionality. Namely, the applications’ measurement inputs will be received directly from the data space developed in WP3 and the prosumer profiling alongside the digital twin model outputs, both developed in WP5, will be additionally utilized as well.

DIGITISE Apps

Energy Savings and Self-Consumption Optimization Application

This application will optimize energy management across the household environment and the different energy/ flexible assets towards maximizing self-consumption and reducing energy costs. The application will step on AI energy forecasts and the flexibility profiles delivered in WP3, real-time data streams from the consumer side (metering, submetering, IoT, generation, storage, EVs) and highly-efficient optimization algorithms to facilitate (i) monitoring and assessment of the energy performance of prosumer assets (energy assets, building systems, along with EVs and charging stations), (ii) define optimal control strategies for enhancing energy savings and maximizing self-consumption, and (iii) further optimize energy performance by continuously assessing the effectiveness of applied strategies and re-deploying updated and more effective ones. In addition, it will deliver an advanced feature for smart control automation towards promoting the fully automated participation of consumers in energy activities, in a human-centric, effortless, and non-intrusive manner. In this context, the feature will be responsible for breaking down the high-level control strategies defined in the project, into fine-grained control signals at the level of specific devices. Such control signals will be executed automatically towards realizing significant energy and economic benefits for the consumers; while fostering social acceptance through the human-centric features the app will offer leveraging on robust baseline user behavioural profiles.

Asset Sizing and Investment Optimization Application

This application will support household level financing of investments in renovation, RES and flexible assets. The application aspires to evidently guide consumers in further enhancing their involvement in energy activities and their role in the energy transition, through the formulation of alternative future scenarios that involve investments in RES, renovation, storage, and EV assets. Through the interaction with the Household Digital Twin, scenarios will be analyzed and assessed in appropriate time horizons, utilizing and assortment of energy and financial related KPIs (addressing RES size, flexibility capacity, renovation potential) and correlating them with relevant financial sector data for the economic assessment of the corresponding investments (i.e., payback period, IRR and ROI, WACC, energy cost savings, flexibility revenues in the midterm). In addition, the application will enable retailers to support end-users at investments in energy transition and thus promote their transforming business role by incorporating in the analysis financing models as made available form the finance industry.

Health and Security Application

This application will realize intelligent, human-centric, and automated control strategies over building assets, towards enhancing the health and security in the household environment. AI consumer profiling analytics (occupancy patterns, daily and seasonal use of the household, comfort profiles) delivered in WP5 and real time data streams for sub-metering devices as well as indoor conditions monitoring will fuse the application to enable monitoring and assessment of the health conditions and security within building, further enabling smart control automation functionalities in case of poor indoor or abnormal, non-secure conditions. In lack of automation, smart suggestions and recommendations will be made available through the Consumer Application in a seamless way.

Consumer Application for Personalized Empowerment and Capacity Building

This application is where the omni-channel UX interfaces will be designed and developed, which will integrate the results of the applications comprising the DIGITISE solution to set the consumer interaction layer. It will include appealing visualizations which will provide the interfaces between consumers/prosumers and the different applications, while also dealing with all the integration needs, which include the technical integration but also the conceptual integration aspects like the end-user prioritization of the services. Omni-channel experiences will be provided both in terms of cross devices experience but also in terms of diverse means of message communication from the cross sectorial services. Access to the services will be provided through multiple devices and viewports like web and mobile interfaces, and in-home displays with consumers to benefit from a seamless experience and consistent messaging across all these channels and tools. Real time information, explainable AI results, valuable insights, and context-aware messages and recommendations generated by the services will be based on user prioritization and will be consistent throughout all the involved sectors. Maintaining a single view of customers across all channels and services will maximize the full potential of personalization, thus promoting digital literacy and empowerment.

Why These Tools Matter: Data-Driven Justification

To further justify the urgent need and timeliness of our applications, we present below data extracted from selected questions addressed to prosumers and aggregators that showcase the importance of developing our proposed suite of applications. These questionnaires were carried out as part of a WP2 task.

More than 80% of ICT providers feel that AI analytics are not only useful for energy but also for other applications (Q46), and all of them expect it to have a neutral or positive impact in terms of improving household energy management strategies (Q52). More importantly though, the input from the prosumers themselves is illuminating. First, they already utilize smart energy devices (e.g., smart thermostats and lighting) (Q2) and would be 80% would be willing to install additional home equipment to better manage their energy consumption (Q4). More importantly only less than 4% would reject the idea of using a service that would automatically suggest and implement energy-saving measures in their homes (Q14). Another aspect prosumers highly indicate relates to their living conditions. About 67% of them agree that it is important to track the environment footprint of their energy usage (Q11), would like to be provided with insights on the health and safety of the indoor air quality of their household (Q15), and would be interested in a smart system that integrates health, security, and energy applications (Q16).

Additionally, we received input on the type of functionalities this system should support. First, 83% of them would like to understand better their consumption behavior if possible (Q35). Additionally, around 76% would prefer to set and monitor personalized energy-saving goals (Q17) and to achieve them, they would trust the system to automatically adjust the already-installed smart devices (Q25). Last, only 8% would not like to receive information on possible future household investments, leading to ultimately better energy efficiency and long-term financial gains (Q27).

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