Ensuring future clean electrical energy supply through cloud computing

Power delivery systems are composed of generation, transmission and distribution system networks, loads, control and management systems. In the effort of providing a clean electric power to the consumer not only the energy sources need to be reformed but also all the above components have to be considered simultaneously using Information and Communication Technology (ICT) to reduce cost, save energy, increase sustainability and reliability. In addition to the traditional energy generation, transmission and distribution networks, the future grids expected to accommodate the distributed renewable energy generation, energy storage, demand side management systems, the ability to moderate consumption through dynamic pricing and demand response load reduction signaling based on grid and market conditions. Such smart grid applications require computing infrastructures that guarantees scalability, real-time, consistency, privacy and security. This paper tries to assess the smart grid applications computing requirements, review literatures in this topic and suggest green solutions.