IMCL2017 Tutorials

#1 Smart Cities Energy Management: A Cooperative Perspective

Estimated duration of the tutorial

2 hours

Abstract

The major challenges that urban living faces over the last years, as a result of the increasing population density, have triggered the discussion for the development of effective solutions that target the economic, social, and environmental sustainability of urban areas. In addition, environmental concerns have stressed the need for the development of innovative solutions for the effective and flexible utilization of the renewable energy. To this end, Demand Response (DR) is considered as an effective and reliable solution that target to alter electricity consumers’ demand profile in order to match the supply, while aiming at the efficient incorporation of renewable energy resources. In this Tutorial, we aim to present the new trend on energy management in cities that is based on the cooperation of buildings as an alternative solution for the optimum management of the energy generated, stored and consumed in urban buildings. Since the issue of energy consumption management is of extreme interest both from the research community as well as industry, the proposed tutorial surely covers a timely topic, and it can provide useful hints to researchers on available research lines and industrial developer on most recent and promising advances in the fields.

Scope and depth of coverage of the targeted topics

The necessity for reducing pollution and increasing the quality of life in urban areas, as well as for developing a sustainable power system is the driving forces behind the advent of smart cities. The concept of DR-based energy management is highly promoted as an effective solution for the efficient operation of the smart grid. This Tutorial is divided into two parts. The first part aims at providing a comprehensive review of various DR schemes. Precisely, a discussion will be provided that deals with various DR issues regarding the application of DR programs, such as objectives, management issues, types of consumers, communication requirements and adversative conditions in DR implementation. On the second part of the Tutorial, a thorough discussion on research efforts and initiatives on the microgrid idea will be provided, with special emphasis on schemes that are based on the cooperation of buildings in an urban environment, in order to achieve optimal utilization of energy that is generated, stored and consumed in these buildings. Precisely, a thorough discussion on the various proposals on urban building clustering as an alternative small-scale grid solution will be provided, where the participants/consumers are able to cooperate in order to increase their energy self-sufficiency and to decrease the city’s CO2 emissions. Furthermore, optimization efforts will be also discussed which target either the determination of the optimal size of the building cluster/microgrid or/and the optimal cooperative methodology (e.g. energy storage scheduling, direct energy exchange between buildings, etc.) In both parts, all major solutions will be analyzed and compared by offering the unique vision provided by the combined experience of the speakers, encompassing theoretical and industrial research, advanced research concepts and relevant testbed experiments. At the end of the tutorial, the speakers will summarize the major points and leave time for additional discussion involving directly the audience.

Description of the intended audience

The intended audience includes Ph.D. students, researchers, and professionals working in the communications and the smart-grid fields.

The Speakers

John Vardakas, Ph.D., Senior Researcher, Iquadrat Informatica S.L. Barcelona – Spain. John received the Dipl.-Eng. degree in electrical and computer engineering from Democritus University of Thrace, Xanthi, Greece, in 2004 and the Ph.D. degree from the University of Patras, Patras, Greece in 2012. He is currently a Senior Researcher with Iquadrat Informatica, Barcelona, Spain. He has published more than 80 papers in journals and international conferences (h-index 14). Dr. Vardakas has participated in more than 10 competitive projects (ICT, Marie-Curie, ENIAC). He is also a regular reviewer in a number of international journals and conferences, while he has participated in the organization of several conferences. His research interests include performance analysis and simulation of communication networks and smart grids. Dr. Vardakas is a member of the IEEE, the Optical Society of America, and the Technical Chamber of Greece (TEE).

Christos Verikoukis, Ph.D., Fellow Researcher, Telecommunications Technological Centre of Catalonia, Spain. Christos got his Ph.D. from the Technical University of Catalonia in 2000. He is currently a Fellow Researcher at CTTC (Head of the SMARTECH department) and an adjunct professor at Barcelona University (Electronics Department). He has published 116 journal papers and over 170 conference papers (h-index 23). He is also co-author in 3 books, 16 chapters in different books and he has filled 3 patents. He has supervised 15 Ph.D. students and 5 Post Docs researchers since 2004. Dr.Verikoukis has participated in more than 30 competitive projects while he has serve as the Principal investigator in national projects in Greece and Spain. He served as the technical manager of the ITNGREENET and the CELTIC-GREEN-T and LOOP projects. Dr.Verikoukis received the best paper award of the Communication QoS, Reliability &Modeling Symposium (CQRM) symposium in the IEEE ICC 2011 & ICC 2014 conference, of the Selected Areas in Communications Symposium in the IEEE GLOBECOM 2014 conference, of the EUCNC 2016 conference and the EURASIP 2013 Best Paper Award for the Journal on Advances in Signal Processing. He was the general Chair of the 17th, 18th and 19th IEEE Workshop on Computer-Aided Modeling, Analysis and Design of Communication Links and Networks (CAMAD), and the TPC Co-Chair of the 15th IEEE International Conference on eHealth Networking, Application & Services (Healthcom) and the 7th IEEE Latincom Conference. He has also served as the symposium co-chair of the CQRM symposium in the IEEE ICC 2015 & 2016 conference. He is currently the Chair of the IEEE ComSoc Technical Committee on Communication Systems Integration and Modeling (CSIM).

#2 Design Guidelines for Location-based Mobile Games for Learning

Download the slides as PDF

Estimated duration of the tutorial

1.5 hours

Abstract

The objective of this course, is to introduce the participants to location-based games and to the challenges relating to designing them. Key characteristics of this new genre are introduced first, followed by a design framework and a set of design guidelines. Examples of location-based games will be presented and typical design patterns as extracted from previous workshops will be discussed. This course has already been run in the frame of several conferences and summer schools (Sintoris, 2014). Typical course participants include interaction designers, game designers and developers, practitioners and researchers interested in location-based games. The course is presented by researchers who have been involved in designing and studying human interaction with location-based games for many years. Examples of games developed by the course organizers include MuseumScrabble, RebelsVsSpies, Taggling, etc. The course is structured as following:

1. key concepts and definitions
2. examples,
3. positioning technologies,
4. designing location-based games,
5. design guidelines,
6. hands-on experience: design of a game.

The Speakers

N. Avouris, N.Yiannoutsou, C. Sintoris