Persons involved: Susanne Boll, Martin Fränzle, Jorge Marx Gomez, Axel Hahn, Daniela Nicklas, Oliver Theel, Andreas Winter

We research and develop new IT concepts for the energy-efficient design, modelling and evaluation of production and transport systems.

The importance of production and transport for the consumption of primary energy and the associated impact on the environment and society is enormous. In addition, legal requirements and the increasing price hikes for oil, gas and electricity are forcing companies and consumers to use energy sparingly. Lower energy consumption with unchanged production volumes and transport performance requires greater energy efficiency. Energy-intensive industries and the transport sector in particular need new approaches to respond to rising costs through more energy-efficient production and transport. New machine, vehicle or building technology is associated with high investments and is often only taken into account in new investments.
Modern production and transport systems are unimaginable without information and communication technology. The influence of information and communication technology on energy efficiency is considerable. This influence must be utilised for the energy-efficient design of such systems. Intelligent control systems can open up considerable savings potential with just a small investment. This is accompanied by an improvement in performance, benefits and resource efficiency.

With a wide range of topics, Oldenburg Computing Science contributes to the planning, design, monitoring and optimisation of energy-efficient production and transport systems.

• Energy-conscious context and system modelling: A better understanding of the overall system is a prerequisite for its optimisation. Existing models generally take insufficient account of energy aspects. Context models are an important decision-making basis for intelligent, autonomously operating control systems. Here too, energy efficiency must be taken into account when making decisions.
• Simulation, planning and optimisation: The optimal use of resources, whereby optimality can refer to the resource consumption under normal behaviour or the expected consumption over a set of disturbances, is determined for closed modellable systems using simulation, state exploration and planning methods. For systems that cannot be modelled exactly or that change over time, the necessary adaptivity is ensured by reactive planning approaches and advance construction of reactive strategies.
• Reliability of data and services: The reliability of data and services also increases the efficiency of the systems. If reliable data and communication services are not available, transport chains, for example, cannot be optimally coordinated.
• Sustainability-orientated operational environmental information systems (BUIS 2.0): From a strategic point of view, BUIS are those information systems that serve and support the idea of sustainable development in a company. From a (more concrete) tactical point of view, BUIS are all those information systems that deal with material/energy efficiency, emission/waste minimisation/reduction, disposal, stakeholder support and compliance with legal regulations in a holistic manner.
• Material flow management: Material flow management tracks and evaluates the operating resources used in the context of the entire utilisation chain, particularly against the background of resource consumption.
• Architectures for energy efficiency and reliability: New control systems require new architectures that integrate new control loops and optimisation processes into the systems. Entire company architectures may have to be reorganised and redesigned from an energy efficiency perspective.
• Sensor networks and sensor technology: Intelligent, autonomously operating systems that react to situations and environmental changes require sensors whose data is summarised and transported in sensor networks.
• Interoperability: Interoperable ICT systems require better coordination for the design of larger systems. Intermodal passenger transport across different transport systems requires, for example, the exchange of timetables or information about delays.