Innovations in smart grid technology and renewable energy can boost nationwide power generation, lower costs and optimize electricity consumption. This story will talk some developments in smart power distributor in brief.
Electric energy is one of the most important resources in any economy and the challenge posed by its supply must be handled well. The extent to which the economy can grow is fully dependent on the efficiency and sustainability of energy supply to industries and homes. In the past few years, the level of energy waste in India has been on the rise, underscoring the need for the government and other stakeholders to address issues of sustainable development. India is the world’s fourth largest in installed capacity, according to the Ministry of Urban Development’s 2014 Concept Note on Smart Cities. Yet it continues to be a country with scarce electricity distribution. Here, smart grids can be a good way of bringing in transformative operations. The old traditional system lacks good financial planning, resulting in losses due to poor revenue collection methods. The system is also ageing with poorly-maintained infrastructure such as transmission lines, among others. Accenture’s Digitally Enabled Grid of 2014 report found that India’s rapidly-growing distribution systems need to address network and sustainability issues of outage response, to help in reducing cost per kilowatt-hour (kWh). This can be achieved through theft reduction of electricity and electrical installation systems. India’s smart grid establishment received a big boost after blackouts that affected more than 600 million people in 2012. Smart energy technology entails laying a secure and ubiquitous communication link between power sources to the endpoint to ensure a good and efficient communication channel that will enhance good connectivity. In case of disconnection, there is a real-time response that ensures quality service delivery. The system also ensures consumption of required amounts of power, helping to optimize costs to customer. The smart grid technology is also able to predict and monitor possible failures and help technical teams to preempt possible solutions. Smart grid technology allows the grid to be fed by alternate energy sources such as solar, wind and hydrocarbons, among others. The integration of this power generation into the smart grid enables further decentralization of distribution and boosts nationwide generation. Such innovation encourages low-cost systems that reduce transmission costs and have minimal impact on the environment. Energy can neither be created nor destroyed, but only transmitted from one state to another. The political leadership and other stakeholders need to unite in sensitizing members of the public on the importance of energy conservation by using smart technologies.
“Assured Electricity supply” is one of the identified pillars of “Smart City – Core Infrastructure” identified by the Smart City guidelines of GoI (Govt. of India).
Challenges with existing Power distribution network
Utilities must reduce costs while ensuring operational excellence, rapidly digitize end-to-end processes, and improve performance. They also face the risks of balancing demand peaks with low intermittent production. Urban power distribution network operators are facing a growing number of challenges and demands from both consumers and the authorities today. First of all, the commercial consequences of power discontinuities are becoming more severe, urging operators to seek a feasible network upgrade solution. Further, there are new needs emerging, such as charging stations for electrical vehicles (EV), integration of distributed power generation, and support for demand response programs. In short, in urban power distribution, existing cable networks have to take on continuous increasing power consumption. When the decision to upgrade and build networks with the ability to meet today’s efficiency and supply quality requirements, the operators typically face the challenge of a huge existing network, which includes different generations of primary and secondary substations, provided with a wide variety of equipment. In most cases, this infrastructure is aging, which adds the subsequent risk for increased component failure rates. Additionally, automation is a desired functionality, as dense traffic makes it difficult to access the secondary substations.
Energy Management system is essential today to
- To achieve and maintain optimum energy procurement and utilization, throughout the organization
- To minimize energy costs / waste without affecting production & quality
- To reduce import dependency
- To enhance energy security, economic competitiveness, and environmental quality
Smart City Power Distribution
The Smart City Power Distribution concept, with its intelligent equipment solutions, has been developed for the demanding urban power distribution environment. Undisturbed power distribution is required not only to guarantee normal life and business conditions, but also to ensure availability of electricity to emergency services. To secure undisturbed power distribution to critical areas, such as commercial centers, it is necessary to receive early pre-fault warnings and to have a network where alternative supply routes can be arranged. In emergency situations, it is essential to have fast and accurate fault localization, fault isolation and power restoration via remote reconfiguration of the network. Further, emerging needs for energy savings, demand response, integration of distributed generation and support for the charging of electrical vehicles have to be met with real-time grid information. The Smart City Power Distribution concept
- Meets the total needs of urban power distribution, but allows step-wise, situation-sensitive implementation to gain the most feasible solution
- Relies on standards, which allows for integration into existing systems, as well as ensuring adaptability as there are new developments and the needs change
The specialized distribution grid automation components include the essential functions for the grid nodes. These components are able to carry out automatic functions, either on their own in a local automation scheme or in cooperation with a remote system, either automatically or manually. Local automation systems can be used for automatic supply changeover in transformer stations and by utilizing GOOSE messages (based on IEC 61850). Smart City Power Distribution fits, regardless of the size and age of the urban power distribution system in question. The solutions combine sensible topology of the primary network, appropriate primary equipment and intelligent protection, as well as control and automation features into one optimal functional entity. The offering ranges from a single component to total systems, including related services. Combined with the possibility for a step-wise implementation, it is easy to adjust to the overall development of the urban infrastructure and the distribution grid and its gradual renewal. The flexibility of smart distribution solutions makes them feasible for both new and existing installations.
Smart Meters – Power Calculation Smartly
Smart meter are capable of communicating the real time energy-consumption of an electrical system in very short intervals of time to the connected utility. In the electronic meters/electromechanical meters, the cumulative number of electricity units was recorded at the end of a month (or more) whereas a smart reader is connected to the utility which is capable of transmitting the electricity usage on a real-time basis. Smart meters thus facilitate real-time pricing, automated recording of the electricity consumption and a complete eradication of errors due to manual readings and reduce labor cost and enable instant fault detection. Smart meters not only enhance the ease with which electricity bills are generated and transmitted, they also provide better control on one’s electricity consumption by providing real time consumption data. The consumer can monitor his/her electricity usage and in turn optimize his/her consumption. A smart meter also offers insights into the expenditure on electricity which proves to be a great incentive for consumers to save electricity and in turn reduce the pressure on the constantly depleting non-renewable sources of energy. A network of all the smart meters connected to a smart grid will positively influence the methods and modes of electricity generation, transmission and distribution.
