Document from the year 2013 in the subject Engineering - Power Engineering, grade: Highest grade, University of Porto, language: English, abstract: Agent technology has been enlightened as the correct vector to promote decentralization, autonomous operation and active management activities in power distribution system operation. As a matter of fact, an adequate agent-based modeling can produce flexible, extensible, and robust systems, which are features of utmost importance to a smooth modernization of power systems. Moreover, the agent paradigm can provide a well-established notion of intelligence/smartness to be progressively applied along with the modernization of power distribution systems. Hence, in this document, an extensive survey about the applications of agent technology to power engineering is provided, aiming at helping engineers and academia to identify gaps in the state of the art to be explored in the future. This survey is presented and discussed highlighting the applications more directly related to the scope of the power distribution systems.