Dear Readers,

I am delighted to welcome you to the inaugural edition of Energy Informatics Review, the magazine of ACM SIGENERGY. We hope to provide a high-quality outlet for research in the general area of energy informatics. EIR will be a rapid turnaround scholarly publication to serve our emerging community.

This inaugural issue contains extended versions of the three Best Papers in ACM eEnergy 2021. It also includes invited papers from some luminaries in our field. The result is an excellent issue that covers a range of topics, some in depth, and some with a broader vision. I look forward to maintaining this level of excellence in the issues to come.

This issue represents the results of many hours of dedicated work by the Publications Chair, the Area Editors, reviewers, and, of course, the authors. My thanks to them all.

Happy Reading!

S. Keshav
Editor-in-Chief

I am delighted to write this column for the inaugural issue of Energy Informatics Review. Let me begin by thanking S. Keshav and the entire EIR team for all the hard work in making the newsletter go from an idea to reality in record time.

As you may know, our SIG was approved by the ACM a year ago, after functioning as an Emerging Interest Group (EIG) for two years. Our transition to a permanent full-fledged SIG enables us to create a vibrant community of researchers, educators and practitioners in the field of Energy Informatics. Our motivation for forming the SIG is to address the much felt need to bring together the computing community to deal with the critical issues of climate change and the transition of the energy system to a carbon-free future. Computing and data science techniques will be key drivers of this transformation!

Since its inception, the volunteer group in charge of running the SIG has been hard at work. The SIG is responsible for the organization of two ACM conferences—e-Energy and Buildsys—and associated workshops. We have worked closely with the organization and steering committees of both conferences to navigate conference organization in the face of pandemic uncertainties. ACM e-Energy was successfully held earlier this summer in a virtual format, and ACM Buildsys will be held in November in a hybrid format. An important goal for the SIG to build a diverse and inclusive community. We are supporting a travel grant program to enable students to attend Buildsys, especially in the light of pandemic travel challenges. Online attendance at Buildsys is free this year for all attendees, and we look forward to your participation.

Workshops are an important part of our conference program. Both e-Energy and Buildsys have organized numerous workshops on cutting-edge topics this year. These workshops span topics such as Climate Change and Sustainability, Machine Learning for Energy, Fairness Accountability and Ethics in Energy systems, and Accessibility of Buildings and Cities.

ACM e-Energy has instituted a new paper process this year which will enable authors to revise and resubmit paper to address reviewer feedback during the review cycle. We hope that this new process will enable the conference to accept more paper while maintaining the high quality of the program.

Finally, we are instituting an awards program to recognize junior, and senior, members of our community and to recognize past papers that have had a strong impact. More information on the awards program will be announced soon. We also established a social media presence for the SIG. Please visit us at https://energy.acm.org or follow us on social media for up-to-date information about the SIG’s activities. We also look forward to your ideas on how the SIG can serve you better.

Prashant Shenoy
Chair, ACM SIGEnergy

Technical Papers

• Information Batteries: Storing Opportunity Power with Speculative Execution
  Jennifer Switzer (UC San Diego, USA); Barath Raghavan (USC, USA)
• Data Analytics for Cybersecurity Enhancement of Transformer Protection
  Martiya Zare Jahromi (University of Toronto); Amir Abiri Jahromi (University of Toronto); Deepa Kundur (University of Toronto); Scott Sanner (University of Toronto); Marthe Kassouf (Hydro-Quebec Research Institute (IREQ))
• The Next Stage of Green Electricity Labeling: Using Zero-Knowledge Proofs for Blockchain-based Certificates of Origin and Use
  Johannes Sedlmeir (University of Bayreuth, Germany); Fabiane Völter (Fraunhofer FIT, Germany); Jens Strüker (University of Bayreuth, Germany)
• Privacy-Preserving Energy Storage Sharing with Blockchain and Secure Multi-Party Computation
  Nan Wang (Australian National University); Sid Chi-Kin Chau (Australian National University); Yue Zhou (Australian National University)
• Towards Online Optimization for Power Grids
  Deming Yuan (Nanjing University of Science and Technology); Abhishek Bhardwaj(Australian National University); Ian Petersen (Australian National University); Elizabeth Ratnam (Australian National University); Guodong Shi (The University of Sydney)
• Online Peak-Aware Energy Scheduling with Untrusted Advice
  Russell Lee (UMass Amherst); Jessica Maghakian (Stony Brook University); Mohammad Hajiesmaili (UMass Amherst); Jian Li (SUNY-Binghamton University); Ramesh Sitaraman (UMass Amherst & Akamai Tech); Zhenhua Liu (Stony Brook University)
• A Holistic Review on Advanced Bi-directional EV Charging Control Algorithms
  Xiaoying Tang (The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shenzhen); Chenxi Sun (The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shenzhen); Suzhi Bi (Shenzhen University); Shuoyao Wang (Shenzhen University); Angela Yingjun Zhang (The Chinese University of Hong Kong)
• Empiricism and Collaboration on Grid Data Analytics: The Need for a New Information Ecosystem
  Alexandra von Meier (UC Berkeley); Laurel N. Dunn (PingThings, Inc.)
• Characteristic Profile: Improved Solar Power Forecasting Using Seasonality Models
  Julian de Hoog (University of Melbourne); Maneesha Perera (The University of Melbourne); Peter Ilfrich ( Melbourne, Australia); Saman Halgamuge (The University of Melbourne)
• Automated Generation of Models for Demand Side Flexibility Using Machine Learning: An Overview
  Kevin Förderer (Karlsruhe Institute of Technology); Veit Hagenmeyer (Karlsruhe Institute of Technology); Hartmut Schmeck (Karlsruhe Institute of Technology)

Editorials

• Editor-in-Chief’s Message
  S. Keshav (University of Cambridge, UK)
• Message from the Chair
  Prashant Shenoy (UMass Amherst, USA)

Download November Issue [PDF]