Industry 4.0 Era and Sustainable Energy Performance

Dear Colleagues,

The growing concern toward the transition to decarbonization and sustainable development in industrial activities can be addressed by the yet unexploited efficiency potential of energy performances of industrial systems.

Indeed, the recent diffusion of the Industry 4.0 paradigm offers numerous innovative opportunities to improve the sustainability of energy use and generation in a more efficient and effective manner.

With the availability of improved measurements in industrial processes provided by the Internet of Things (IoT) and cloud platforms, adaptive control strategies achieved using machine learning algorithms and simulation to analyze, compare, and optimize energy performances, as well as advanced communication capabilities fostered by the increased integration of systems, new efficiency measures can now be adopted toward this target.

Furthermore, the improved ability of support, control, and counteraction provided to personnel through the use of wearables, mobile devices, and virtual reality tools can also assist in this path.

This Special Issue seeks the contribution of high-quality theoretical papers, methodological studies, and empirical research (or combination thereof) concerning the application of the Industry 4.0 paradigm to foster the sustainability of energy performance.

The main topics of interest include but are not limited to the use of Industry-4.0-enabled methods and technologies for:

• Energy efficiency improvement of industrial processes;
• Energy efficiency improvement of other applications (buildings, transportation, etc.);
• Demand response management;
• Smart grid management;
• Energy information systems;
• Real-time measurements of energy efficiency in industrial processes;
• Energy data analysis and diagnostics;
• AI-based intelligent solutions for energy efficiency;
• Energy performance improvement case studies;
• Circularity in energy, utilities, and resources;
• Decision support tools for energy efficiency.

Prof. Dr. Vito Introna
Dr. Annalisa Santolamazza
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Sustainability is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• industrial energy management 
• energy performances 
• Industry 4.0
• industrial energy sustainability
• energy benchmarking 
• energy modeling and simulation
• energy data management