Guest Editorial: Introduction to IEEE Control Systems Letters Special Section on Multi-Agent Coordination for Energy Systems: From Model Based to Data-Driven Methods

Distributed control architectures are paving the way for the next generation of energy system infrastructures, primarily due to the combination of smart grid technologies and energy market deregulation. The new framework offers increased privacy and decision autonomy for the end-users, but it poses challenges due to the lack of direct control of the aggregate behavior of a large number of energy end-users. To compensate for the resulting uncertainty, the end-users should coordinate at different levels in the power system hierarchy, so that their aggregate behavior can help achieve global objectives, without hindering their privacy and local autonomy.