SoCS: Energy Sustainability and Smart Grids: Fostering and Supporting Cultures of Participation in the Energy Landscape of the Future

智能电网的愿景是支持生产、传输、分配和消费能源的新方式，以改变和提高未来能源环境的可持续性。这为社会计算系统和智能电网应用领域的研究提供了一个独特的协同机会。该项目将证明，一方面，为了实现智能电网的愿景和期望，技术发展是必要的，但还不够：促进和支持人类行为的变化同样重要。另一方面，社会计算系统面临着有趣的、具体的、独特的研究问题，以应对与智能电网相关的挑战。该项目将设计和开发：(a)基于参与文化的社会计算系统的初始理论框架的组成部分；(b) HYDRA的初始架构和交互机制，这是一个开放、协作、生活知识环境，以促进和支持不同层次的参与生态。在自然环境下的评估将作为主要成果为未来的发展提供要求和指导方针。该项目将超越现有的技术研究，创造新的社会技术系统的原型，赋予人类权力，并为改变他们的行为提供机会、激励和奖励。与当地科技公司、当地政府和国际研究人员的合作将确保我们的研究产生广泛的影响。除了从我们的具体开发中吸取的经验教训之外，我们研究的理论基础将使我们的方法、组件、体系结构、需求和指导方针适用于大量的社会计算系统。

The vision for the Smart Grid is to support new ways of producing, transmitting, distributing, and consuming energy to change and improve the sustainability of future energy environments. This represents a unique opportunity for synergy between research in social-computational systems and the Smart Grid application domain. This project will demonstrate that on the one hand, for the Smart Grid effort to live up to its vision and expectations, technological developments are necessary but not sufficient: fostering and supporting changes in human behavior are equally important. On the other hand, social-computational systems face interesting, specific, and unique research questions to cope with the challenges associated with Smart Grids.The project will design and develop: (a) components of an initial theoretical framework for social-computational systems based on cultures of participation and (b) initial architecture and interaction mechanisms for HYDRA, an open, collaborative, living knowledge environment to foster and support ecologies of different levels of participation. Evaluation in naturalistic settings will provide requirements and guidelines for future developments as a major outcome.The project will transcend existing technological research by creating prototypes of new socio-technical systems to empower human beings and provide opportunities, incentives, and rewards for changing their behaviors. Collaborations with local technology companies, local governments, and international researchers will ensure the broad impact of our research. Beyond the lessons learned from our specific developments, the theoretical grounding of our research will make our methodologies, components, architectures, requirements, and guidelines applicable to a large number of social-computational systems.