Smart Grid Communication Networks

While there is a general consensus on the need for communication networks supporting a two-way flow of data information between the various entities in the electric grid, issues related to network performance, suitability, interoperability, and security are being addressed by ITL. Going forward, this project will focus on identifying gaps in the communication protocols supporting smart grid applications. By bridging the gap between the stakeholder and user communities and the standard developing organizations (SDOs) working on communication standards, this project will promote the use and deployment of interoperable communication standards for Smart Grid. In addition, the research tools that will be developed and the research findings that will be published as part of this project will create and foster the development of new areas of inquiry into smart grid specific communication technologies.

Objective: To accelerate the development of scalable, reliable, secure, and interoperable wireless communications and standards for smart grid applications and through measurement science-based guidance and tools enable informed decision making by 2014.

What is the new technical idea? While there are many choices of communications and networking standards, most of these standards were not developed specifically for smart grid applications. Traditionally, technology decisions have been dictated by offerings of system vendors, while business decisions are regulated by federal, state, and regional regulatory commissions and organizations (e.g. the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, state Public Utility Commissions, and the North American Electric Reliability Corporation). The new technical idea is to work directly with the smart grid stakeholders (utilities, regulators and consumers) and the telecommunication industry (vendors, SDOs, service providers) to identify communication requirements for smart grid applications, evaluate and develop communication standards, and develop guidelines and recommendations on their use and deployment.

What is the research plan? The research plan includes (1) the development and use of system-level modeling to study communication protocols in support of smart grid applications, and (2) support of the smart grid communication standardization efforts.

System-level modeling of smart grid communications
Smart grids are composed of multiple interconnected systems consisting of electrical distribution systems and the communication infrastructures supporting them. These systems are not self-contained, but will affect each other’s behavior through mutual feedback whereby events in one system trigger events in other systems. In order to accurately characterize the entire system behavior, the user and research communities need integrated models that capture the details of the various systems in addition to the interactions between them. With the exception of recent initiatives that are developing multi-level system modeling platforms (GridLab-D at the Pacific Norwest National Laboratory and THYME at Oak Ridge National Laboratory), most models available today tend to hone in on only a few particular aspects of the overall system, for example, transmission, distribution, or communication and ignore the remaining interdependencies. The plan is to review the state of the art in smart grid system-level modeling and leverage existing efforts that would allow the development and evaluation of communication protocol models for smart grid applications. Key steps in the plan include:

• Identify the level of abstraction in each model description
• Develop modeling and simulation scenarios and network traffic profiles based on the use cases developed by OpenSG SG-NET
• Use real-world smart grid metering data provided by Stanford University to develop realistic electrical network load profiles for use in simulation scenarios
• Develop an integrated analytical modeling and simulation framework (leveraging existing efforts) that examines both power-grid and communication networks operations
• Conduct performance evaluation and capture high level interactions between systems
• Identify gaps in existing communication systems and identify modifications that would enable the development of better protocols or modifications to existing protocols
• Identify security vulnerabilities and develop mechanisms to address them or to detect attacks on the smart grid
• Use gap analysis to develop recommendations for Smart Grid deployment based on model results
• Make models available for others to use
• Publish findings in professional conference/journal articles
  

Support of the smart grid standardization efforts
ITL will continue to lead and contribute to the activities of the SGIP Priority Action Plans related to wireless and powerline communications (PAP 2 and 15). In addition ITL staff will continue to participate in international standard activities related to smart grid.

Outcomes:

• ITL staff led the development of quantitative communication requirements that can be used by utilities, vendors, researchers to develop and deploy communication technologies for Smart Grid.
• • Enabled OpenSG SG-NET to compile over 1400 communication requirements http://osgug.ucaiug.org/UtiliComm/Shared Documents/Interim_Release_4
• ITL staff led the evaluation of networking technologies for Smart Grid communication applications.
• ITL’s staff lead the SGIP Priority Action Plans on the Role of IP in the Smart Grid (PAP#1), Wireless Communications for the Smart Grid (PAP#2), Harmonize Power Line Carrier Standards for Appliance Communications in the Home (PAP#15), and Smart Energy Profile (SEP) 1.X to 2.0 Transition (PAP#18).
• ITL staff have led and contributed to international standard activities on smart grid communications.
• In 2010, Hamid Gharavi served as the technical program chair for IEEE’s first conference on Smart Grid Communications held at NIST in Gaithersburg in October, 2010. He is currently serving as the technical chair for the 2012 Smart Grid Communications Conference in Taiwan.
• Since 2011, Nada Golmie is serving as the lead editor for the IEEE Journal on Selected Areas in Communications Smart Grid series.
  

Outputs: 

• F. Baker editor, “Internet Protocols for the Smart Grid,” Internet Engineering Task Force Request for Comments (RFC) 6272, June 2011
•  “Guidelines for Assessing Wireless Standards for Smart Grid Applications,” NISTIR 7761, July 2011.
•  “Guidelines for the Implementation of Coexistence for Broadband Power Line Communication Standards,” NISTIR-XXXX, April 2012.
• Souryal, M., Gentile, C., Griffith, D., Cypher, D., Golmie, N., "A Methodology to Evaluate Wireless Technologies for the Smart Grid," IEEE Conf. on Smart Grid Communications, pp. 356-361, Oct. 2010.
• Griffith, D., Souryal, M., Gentile, C., and Golmie, N., "An Integrated PHY and MAC Layer Model for Half-Duplex IEEE 802.11 Networks," IEEE Military Communications Conf., pp. 1354-13659, Nov. 2010.
• T. Godfrey, S. Mullen, R. C. Dugan, C. Rodine, D. W. Griffith, and N. Golmie, "Modeling Smart Grid Applications with Co-Simulation," in First IEEE Intl. Conf. on Smart Grid Comm. (SmartGridComm), pp. 291-296, 4-6 Oct. 2010.
• H. Gharavi and Bin Hu, "Multigate Mesh Routing for Smart Grid Last Mile Communications,” IEEE WCNC Cancun, Mexico, 2011.
• H. Gharavi and B. Hu, ”Multigate Communication Network For Smart Grid,” The Proceedings of the IEEE, Vol.  99, Issue 6, June 2011.
• H. Gharavi  and R. Ghafurian, “ Scanning the Issue Smart Grid: The Electric System of the Future,” The Proceedings of the IEEE, Vol.  99, Issue 6, June 2011.
• H. Gharavi and C. Xu, “Distributed Application of the Traffic Scheduling Technique for Smart Grid Advanced Metering Applications Using Multi-Gate Mesh Networks,” Proceedings of the IEEE Globecom’11, Houston, TX, December 2011.
• H. Gharavi and C. Xu, “Traffic Scheduling Technique for Smart Grid Advanced Metering Applications,” IEEE Transactions on Communications, to be published in 2012.
• Gentile, C., Griffith, D., Souryal, M., and Golmie, N., “Throughput and Delay Analysis of Half-Duplex IEEE 802.11 Mesh Networks,” the Proceedings of IEEE ICC 2011, June 2011.
• M. Souryal, N. Golmie, “Analysis of advanced metering over wide-area cellular network,” Proceedings of IEEE Smart Grid Comm., October 2012.
• Gentile, C., Griffith, D., Souryal, M., “Wireless Network Deployment in the Smart Grid: Design and Evaluation Issues,” submitted to IEEE Network Magazine (Special Issue on Communication Infrastructures for Smart Grid), to be published in 2012.
• Lin, J., Xu, G., Griffith, D., Yang, X., and Yu, W., "On Distributed Energy Routing Protocols in the Smart Grid", submitted to IEEE SmartGridComm 2012 Symposium on Smart Grid Services and Management.
• Modeling tools to evaluate wireless communications for Smart Grid
• http://collaborate.nist.gov/twiki-sggrid/bin/view/SmartGrid/PAP02Wireless
• Received SGIP team award for PAP2 (March 2011) and PAP18 (December 2011)