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ISSUE 4 | 2012

Smart grid innovation • Data analytics • Empower Demand Smart Energy International

Keys to Smart Grid SecurityBy Dave Buster, Director, Solutions Architecture, Elster Solutions

METERING INTERNATIONAL ISSUE - 4 | 201228

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For the past couple of years, the smart grid world has been concentrated mainly around North America, Australia and Europe, with the focus on smart electrical meters. Utilities and governments from other countries were curious about the deployments in those regions, and they began taking the pulse of these regions, using their work in the smart grid industry to pave the way for their region to turn the smart grid concept into reality.

Today the map of smart grid deployments is much larger and smart grid activities continue to spread across new geographical areas. The Chinese government recently released its five-year plan, where the smart grid is at the forefront of the economic engine. Chinese meter manufacturers are also investing in the export market, supported by various recent acquisitions or joint ventures and their participation in local smart meter deployment. India is also making some large scale experiments with low power radio frequency (LPRF)-enabled meter deployments, and the India Smart Grid Forum is building a serious plan for the coming years. Japan recently released their first specifications for smart meters and the local utility, TEPCO, is targeting rollouts with aggressive timeframes, while other Asian smart grid markets are opening up, such as South Korea, Thailand, Taiwan and Indonesia.

So far electrical meters have been the key driver for the smart grid dynamic, pushing distribution and transmission equipment to evolve, like data concentrators that collect information from the smart meters and send them back to the backhaul. Smart substations with power quality and analytics will be next. Water, gas and heat meter deployment waves are in preparation, and smart homes and buildings applications are accelerating.

Across the globe, we see different trends emerging for communication requirements, metrology, security (anti-tampering and encryption) and advanced functions. At the system level, these trends translate into different hardware structures for meters (plug-in communication modules versus one printed circuit board, for instance). The semiconductor industry is also challenged by fragmented standards that result in solutions ranging from fully integrated systems on chip (SoC) to discrete solutions. The compromise between integration and fixed function versus standards evolution has been a key concern from day one on the smart grid journey: many progresses have been made, the supplier landscape has evolved, and some technical solutions are now available. The common theme remains the need for optimized system costs and reliable solutions.

One might ask, since some solutions are currently available, if the smart grid is now ready for commoditization on a larger scale. In practice, many challenges are yet to be solved, certainly at the system level (power, isolation, protection) but also particularly at the integration level, which is not limited only to hardware. At the industry level, keeping the end user in the loop will also be one critical factor for smart grid adoption, and players will have to be creative to succeed.

COMMUNICATIONS TRENDS AND DEVELOPMENTSCommunications is a key element of the smart grid. On one hand, standards are making progress:

SMART GRID CHALLENGES FUEL THE INNOVATION PIPELINEBy Olivier Monnier, Markus Staeblein and Don Shaver, Texas Instruments Incorporated (TI)

• Major local powerline communications (PLC) standards like PRIME and G3 concentrate high market attention with many new suppliers participating, and we are starting to see some volume deployments in areas such as Spain.

• Worldwide standards organizations are pushing for larger market adoption like IEEE P1901.2, ITU G.9903, G.9904 for PLC and IEEE 802.15.4g. and ZigBee® for RF technologies.

On the other hand, PLC standards are still fragmented, so integration is not advisable and flexibility remains key. Narrowband PLC standards may converge in a couple of years, and the PLC market will expand at the same time, leading to further integration and optimization. Also, new PLC technology could be developed in the next two to three years to provide better spectral efficiency. New communication techniques are also emerging, like Wi-Fi, which is low power enough and cost compatible with a large deployment, or near field communication (NFC), used as a prepayment solution or for local data logging, for instance.

Each of these communications techniques is addressed by one of two hardware methods – an integrated SoC or a system of discrete components. Not to mention the software piece of the system, the communication stack that must also be integrated into the application. For simplicity, dealing with only one type of communication would ease this integration; in practice developers are challenged to integrate more than one stack.

COMBINING THE BEST OF EACH COMMUNICATION TO EXTEND THE REACHFor instance, usage of LPRF versus PLC for meters has been a key question for the past years, including a few areas of concern:• Cost of infrastructure• Topology of the grid• Rural regions versus dense urban areas.

These are just a few of the typical proxies that help paint high level requirements and determine the type of communications needed. However, it is now clear that the key requirement for utility and meter manufacturers is the connectivity success rate, which is the ability to access and read any meter in any place in the “last mile reach.” This equation can be solved by developing hybrid networks, combining both wired and wireless solutions, translating in this case to systems combining LPRF and PLC.

For instance, when examining home and building automation, hybrid PLC/LPRF networks are key for delivering a robust smart grid. Even if cost effective, LPRF can easily be affected by nearby wireless devices like Wi-Fi, or signals may not be able to reach all the end points from one single hub in a multi-family apartment building. PLC could also be blocked by the noise generated by different appliances or the structure of the network itself jumping from one breaker to another. PLC and LPRF compensate each other to deliver enhanced robustness, and solutions are available today to integrate PLC and LPRF communications (running on one or both at the same time) onto one device – hardware or software coordination or a combination of both.

THE “POWER” OF SOFTWAREThere are some key challenges and differentiated factors for hybrid

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network and smart grid overall, and one of these is software integration. This can be best illustrated in the case of ultra-low power wireless sensor networks in a home or building environment with a network of battery operated devices, such as temperature, lighting and environmental sensors, where a long battery life is essential. Low power and reduced latency wireless networks are key to reach this longevity goal. In addition, the need for hybrid wired/wireless networks further boost network reliability and lifetime. For example, Texas Instruments (TI) has demonstrated the feasibility and benefit of hybrid networks and has designed ultra-low power media access controller (MAC) software, based on the IEEE 802.15.4e TSCH with enhancement algorithm for power improvements running on an ultra-low power microcontroller by optimizing the active time of the LPRF. Uniquely combined with IPv6 and RPL-based routing, the solution provides global access via internet on a smartphone, delivers increased LPRF network longevity with 802.15.4e TSCH and extra robustness, flexibility and convenience with hybrid PLC/LPRF (Figure 1). An innovative software solution is key, but the integration of this software needs to be simple.

INTEGRATION: SOFTWARE COMING FIRST?The previous example highlighted the need for combined hardware and software to deliver the proper smart grid solution, but it also underlined that integration happens first on the software level and will remain the key challenge of the incoming smart grid systems. Looking at the anatomy of a smart electric meter from a hardware standpoint, metrology, application and communication are the key

elements to consider. Those three components can be integrated onto a single chip, and solutions such as these are available today. In fact, for the past few years, this has been a recurrent request from the market, and integrated SoCs are now an additional option on top of the need for flexibility with discrete designs.

However, it is interesting to see that even a fully integrated solution will still need to integrate various software stacks to incorporate the new functions of the smart meters, including:• Metrology code with the legally relevant portion and the

application specific differentiated one

Figure 1 – Example of an innovative wireless network sensor stack

METERING INTERNATIONAL ISSUE - 4 | 201230

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ABOUT THE AUTHORS: Olivier Monnier is the Worldwide Marketing Manager for TI’s Smart Grid solutions team. He graduated in energy conversion and power electronics at the Ecole Nationale Superieure d’Electricite et de Mecanique (ENSEM, Nancy). He has more than 14 years experience in industrial energy related applications.

Markus Staeblein is the general manager for TI’s Smart Grid solutions team, with responsibility for developing smarter grid solutions through innovative semiconductor products, leading edge software and compliant integrated system solutions. He earned his Bachelor of Science in electronics from FH Wiesbaden, Germany, and his Master’s in business administration from The Open University Business School in Milton Keynes, UK.

Don Shaver is a Texas Instruments fellow and chief architect for TI’s Smart Grid products. He represents TI’s Smart Grid solutions across industry standards organizations and drives TI’s influence on governmental standards and regulatory activities. He earned a Bachelor of Science in electrical engineering as well as a Master of Science and Doctorate in systems and information science, all from Syracuse University.

ABOUT THE COMPANY: With millions of energy meter ICs shipped over the past decade, Texas Instruments is the global systems provider for innovative, secure, economical, and future-proof solutions for the worldwide smart grid. TI offers the industry’s broadest smart grid portfolio of metrology expertise, application processors, communication systems, power management solutions, and analog components.www.ti.com

• Advanced meter management software

• Communication stacks• Application profiles • Device Language Message

Specification (DLMS) • Incoming security standards.

Along with the right hardware, some semiconductor companies are innovating and investing in ways to make software readily available, easy to integrate and simple to use (Figure 2). Extending to more complex systems like energy gateways where one needs to combine several physical layers (PHY) and several MACs running over an advanced operating system such as Linux, the software complexity continues to increase, and it is critical to provide developers a full system solution with all of the hardware, software, tools and support.

MANY INNOVATION OPPORTUNITIES AT THE SYSTEM LEVELInnovation in the smart grid will continue to include a combination of hardware and software, even in places where commoditization seems to be commonly accepted. For instance, with the addition of power quality and analytics with high resolution, high bandwidth metrology and power efficiency can be improved, as well as provide a more smart sensing function to the electric meter. Applied to arc fault detection, safety can also be improved.

Beyond the electrical meter, the smart grid wave is influencing many activities in flow meter applications (e.g. water, gas, heat), and there is a lot of innovation at the system level. In these applications, developers need to find the right balance of hardware and software integration to deliver more communication and advanced functions while still delivering ultra-long battery lifetimes – as many as 10-15 years. It starts with power supply designs to comprehend the various operating modes of the flow meter (active, idle, super-fast wake-up time, power consumption in transmit mode). Then developers need to use an ultra-low power microcontroller consuming fractions of µA in sleep mode. New memory technology like ferroelectric random access memory (FRAM) technology enables designers to slash power numbers in comparison to traditional Flash memory technology. FRAM also makes bi-directional communication and over-the-air upgrades possible. This technology, in addition to security (e.g. encryption, key storage) is now available. LPRF radios need to support the existing standards, such as WMBUS 169 MHz, and reduce power consumption while delivering performance. Here again, the expertise, maturity and quality of the software stack will make the difference, and many investments and research studies are on-going on this realm.

NEW OPPORTUNITIES TO BRING BENEFITS TO THE END USERBeyond the smart grid infrastructure and smart meters, the smart grid wave needs to reach the end consumer and clearly show its benefits. End consumers are typically looking for more security, greater convenience and cheaper energy bills. More accurate billings correspond with the ability to give consumers more detailed information on their energy usage by application and provide an opportunity to adapt behaviour. This technology, referred to as energy disaggregation, is one future major asset of the smart home/smart building applications that involve the measurement of energy, transport of this information via wireless/wired or

hybrid network technology and the treatment of information. It calls for innovation on metrology, the communication network and analytics, and the market is starting to see many applications available in this arena for the consumer – smart plugs, thermostats and more. The ability to extract more information on the low voltage line represents an opportunity for utilities to potentially provide more services to the end users and consumers.

The smart grid journey continues across more regions with various integration levels and multiple standards. The semiconductor industry needs to deliver the necessary flexibility and also the correct level of integration of both software and hardware to support current developments and foreseen high volume ramps. Commoditization is not the default answer when it comes to solving the challenges of the tomorrow’s grid. Innovation is a major piece of ongoing investments to make communication networks more reliable and power friendly, provide more services in addition to electric meter deployments, and find the smart grid a home for end consumers’ benefit. MI

Figure 2 – An integrated smart meter board combines all the hardware required for today’s electric meters with readily available and easy to integrate software

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