Abstract
Wireless, power line communication (PLC), fiber optic, Ethernet, and so forth are among the communication technologies on which smart grid communication infrastructure is envisioned to be built. Among these, wireless and PLC-based solutions are attractive considering the cost of initial deployment. Wireless communication deployment in smart grid covers a variety of environments such as indoor, outdoor, and electric-power-system facilities. Similar diversity is expected in PLC deployment as well covering low voltage (LV), medium voltage (MV), and high voltage (HV) segments of the grid. In spite of being attractive, wireless and PLC channels are very harsh posing great challenges to performance of communication systems. In proposing solutions to smart grid communication needs, two approaches are likely to be followed. One is based on the use of existing wireless and PLC technologies with some modifications, and the other relies upon developing novel communication protocols particularly addressing the smart grid needs. Both of these approaches require an in-depth knowledge of communication channel characteristics. The aim of this study is to reveal the wireless and PLC channel characteristics of smart grid environments in terms of several parameters such as path loss and attenuation, time dispersion, time selectivity, amplitude statistics, and noise characteristics.
Highlights
Utility industry has not been able to sufficiently exploit the advances in communication and information technology so far to improve the electricity grid’s efficiency, reliability, security, and quality of service (QoS)
Understanding of the smartness in the term “smart grid” has been rapidly expanded by the industry from smart metering, that is, more focused on advanced metering infrastructure (AMI) to true smart grid [1]. With this recently endorsed definition, objectives of the smart grid can be summarized as follows [2]: (1) achieving active participation of the consumers in the operations of the grid with the support of AMI, (2) taking advantage of all generation and storage options, (3) enabling the network with self-healing capability to minimize the impact of power outages on consumers, (4) achieving resiliency against physical and cyber attacks, (5) providing good quality of power considering needs of the 21st century, (6) enabling new products, services, and markets, (7) optimizing assets and operating efficiently by minimizing operations and maintenance expenses
power line communication (PLC) and wireless-based solutions seem very attractive considering the cost of initial investment
Summary
Utility industry has not been able to sufficiently exploit the advances in communication and information technology so far to improve the electricity grid’s efficiency, reliability, security, and quality of service (QoS). The communication environment for the customer integration can be decomposed into three distinct communication networks as illustrated in Figure 1: home area network (HAN) for defining the interconnections between devices and the “smart meters,” neighborhood area network (NAN) for referring to the interconnections between “smart meters” and “data collection points,” wide area network (WAN) for describing the interconnections between “data collection points” and the utility In all of these networks, a different communication technology based on a different communication medium, such as Ethernet, fiber optic, wireless, power line, satellites, and so forth, can be selected [1, 4,5,6,7,8].
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