The Application of Ontologies in Multi-Agent Systems in the Energy Sector: A Scoping Review

Multi-agent systems are well-known for their expressiveness to explore interactions and knowledge representation in complex systems. Multi-agent systems have been applied in the energy domain since the 1990s. As more applications of multi-agent systems in the energy domain for advanced functions, the interoperability raises challenge raises to an increasing requirement for data and information exchange between systems. Therefore, the application of ontology in multi-agent systems needs to be emphasized and a systematic approach for the application needs to be developed. This study aims to investigate literature on the application of ontology in multi-agent systems within the energy domain and map the key concepts underpinning these research areas. A scoping review of the existing literature on ontology for multi-agent systems in the energy domain is conducted. This paper presents an overview of the application of multi-agent systems (MAS) and ontologies in the energy domain with five aspects of the definition of agent and MAS; MAS applied in the energy domain, defined ontologies in the energy domain, MAS design methodology, and architectures, and the application of ontology in the MAS development. Furthermore, this paper provides a recommendation list for the ontology-driven multi-agent system development with the aspects of 1) ontology development process in MAS design, 2) detail design process and realization of ontology-driven MAS development, 3) open standard implementation and adoption, 4) inter-domain MAS development, and 5) agent listing approach.