1 research outputs found
For the Grid and Through the Grid: The Role of Power Line Communications in the Smart Grid
Is Power Line Communications (PLC) a good candidate for Smart Grid
applications? The objective of this paper is to address this important
question. To do so we provide an overview of what PLC can deliver today by
surveying its history and describing the most recent technological advances in
the area. We then address Smart Grid applications as instances of sensor
networking and network control problems and discuss the main conclusion one can
draw from the literature on these subjects. The application scenario of PLC
within the Smart Grid is then analyzed in detail. Since a necessary ingredient
of network planning is modeling, we also discuss two aspects of engineering
modeling that relate to our question. The first aspect is modeling the PLC
channel through fading models. The second aspect we review is the Smart Grid
control and traffic modeling problem which allows us to achieve a better
understanding of the communications requirements. Finally, this paper reports
recent studies on the electrical and topological properties of a sample power
distribution network. Power grid topological studies are very important for PLC
networking as the power grid is not only the information source \textit{but
also} the information delivery system - a unique feature when PLC is used for
the Smart Grid.Comment: 26 pages, 6 figures, 2 table