Abstract:Conventional energy sources are becoming scarce and with no (eco-friendly) alternatives deployed at a large scale, it is currently important finding ways to better manage energy consumption. We propose in this paper ICT-related solution directions that concern the energy consumption management within a household. In particular, we consider two underlying objectives, namely: (i) to minimize the energy consumption in households; (ii) to avoid energy consumption peaks for larger residential areas. The proposed solution directions envision a service-oriented approach that is used to integrate ideas from Autonomic Computing and Context-aware Computing: the former influences our considering a selective on/off powering of thermostatically controlled appliances, which allows for energy redistribution over time; the latter influences our using context information to analyze the energy requirements of a household at a particular moment and based on this information, appliances can be powered down. Household-internally, this can help adjusting energy consumption as low as it can be with no violation of the preferences of residents. Area-wise, this can help avoiding energy consumption peaks. It is expected thus that such an approach can contribute to the reduction of home energy consumption in an effective and user-friendly way. Our proposed solution directions are not only introduced and motivated but also partially elaborated through a small illustrative example.