Recent developments, such as smart metering, distributed energy resources, microgrids, and energy storage, have led to an exponential increase in system complexity and have emphasized the need to include customer behavior and social and cultural backgrounds in planning activities. This paper analyzes how emergent behavior in electricity consumption can affect the planning of distribution grids with a smart grid vision. For this, an agent-based model that uses insights from the field of behavioral economics to differentiate four consumer categories (high income, low income, middle class, and early adopters) was used. The model was coupled with a real distribution feeder and customer load curve data, and the results showed that heterogeneity of customer’s preferences, values, and behavior led to very distinct load growth patterns. The results emphasize the relevance of modeling customer’s behavioral aspects in planning increasingly complex power systems.

This article addresses the issue of institutional self-assessment from the use of reports prepared by an Own Evaluation Committee as a support instrument for democratic decision-making in a private Higher Education Institution, located in the southern region of the state of Minas Gerais (Brazil). The objective of this research was to analyze how the self-assessment reports for the 2015-2016-2017 triennium contributed to the construction of the Institutional Development Plan 2019-2023. This is a literature and document review, with a qualitative approach, of descriptive type. The results obtained demonstrate that the institution's management uses self-assessment reports as an instrument to support democratic decision-making in the construction of the Institutional Development Plan and to carry out academic-administrative actions in accordance with the notes made by the university community in the self-assessment. In the end, it is verified the existence of a democratic management in the institutional self-assessment process carried out by the Private Higher Education Institution.