Power line carrier communication based low cost power monitoring and management system

Smart meter is an advanced energy meter which not only measures the electrical energy consumption, but also provides real time data on power consumed by electrical loads. Any smart meter needs an infrastructure, wired/wireless, for data communication with the central server. To enable this two-way communication link, we propose a narrowband Power Line Communication (PLC) system operating at a rate of few kbps and this can be deployed over existing outdoor/indoor power lines. Our design demonstrates reusing the existing wired electrical network to provide communication between the smart meter and a central server. A low-cost dedicated hardware for measuring the power usage of electrical appliance is designed. Further, a user interface is developed to remotely access the power usage measurements stored at the central hub database with features of power management. With the usage data at hand, smart decisions can be made in saving energy and, reducing carbon foot-prints. Our design uses low cost and off the shelf devices and no additional wiring as it communicates over the existing power line infrastructure.