Cloud Computing Technology in Smart Grid

The fast-paced development of power systems necessitates smart grids to facilitate real-time control and monitoring with bidirectional communication and electricity flows. Future smart grids are expected to have reliable, efficient, secured, and cost-effective power management with the implementation of distributed architecture. To focus on these requirements, we provide a comprehensive survey on different cloud computing applications for the smart grid architecture, in three different areas—energy management, information management, and security. In these areas, the utility of cloud computing applications is discussed, while giving directions on future opportunities for the development of the smart grid.