A study on PLC transmission technology with focus on smart grids

Abstract

The Power Line Communication (PLC) technology has a wide variety of applications ranging from a simple communications infrastructure for monitoring systems and residential/industrial control, to broadband internet services. In smart grids context, the transmission of data in the grid can be seen as an alternative to the current system of power grid management, it allows the implementation of a decentralized and flexible electrical system with a wide data network to manage the power consumer and generation. This work is a brief theoretical study on PLC technology and its technical aspects in applications related to data transmission area in smart grid, especially for narrowband transmission in homes. It also presents the design of a PLC data transceiver narrowband that can be used in a conventional power grid. In the end, evaluates the performance of this module in the application's point of view in the context of an AMI (Advanced Metering Infrastructure) system for smart grids. The result show that the PLC technology is reliable and robust if evaluated in indoor (and home area network) context for application in AMI systems. However, its economic viability for this purpose is questionable.