Remarks on the energy of regular graphs

The energy of a graph is the sum of the absolute values of the eigenvalues of its adjacency matrix. This note is about the energy of regular graphs. It is shown that graphs that are close to regular can be made regular with a negligible change of the energy. Also a $k$-regular graph can be extended to a $k$-regular graph of a slightly larger order with almost the same energy. As an application, it is shown that for every sufficiently large $n,$ there exists a regular graph $G$ of order $n$ whose energy $\left\Vert G\right\Vert_{\ast}$ satisfies \[ \left\Vert G\right\Vert_{\ast}>\frac{1}{2}n^{3/2}-n^{13/10}. \] Several infinite families of graphs with maximal or submaximal energy are given, and the energy of almost all regular graphs is determined.