Enabling local authorities to produce short-term energy plans: A multidisciplinary decision support approach

Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to identify the most appropriate multidisciplinary data sources related with energy optimization decision support as well as the related methodologies, tools and techniques for data capturing and processing for each of them. Design/methodology/approach - A review is conducted on the state-of-play of decision support systems for energy optimization, focussing on the municipal sector, followed by an identification of the most appropriate multidisciplinary data sources related with energy optimization decision support. An innovative methodology is outlined to integrate semantically modeled data from multiple sources, to assist city authorities in energy management. Findings - City authorities need to lead relevant actions toward energy-efficient neighborhoods. Although there are more and more energy and other related data available at the city level, there are no established methods and tools integrating and analyzing them in a smart way, with the purpose to support the decision-making process on energy use optimization. Originality/value - A novel multidimensional approach is proposed, using semantic technologies to integrate data from multiple sources, to assist city authorities to produce short-term energy plans in an integrated, transparent and comprehensive way.