A Novel Three phase Energy Meter Model with Wireless data reading and online Billing solution

Abstract Measurement of data electronically leads a combination of benefits that go well beyond the traditional rotor plate energy meter design. In this paper with the help of an energy chip, an improved novel three phase energy metering solution is developed. Automating the progression of measurement through digital wireless communication technique is done to get high accuracy, smooth control and better reliability. The developed energy meter calculates the total average active power mainly for industrial and commercial applications. The hardware circuit accepts three phase voltages and currents as its inputs and provides the output in the form of serial interfaced data equivalent to the average real power. This serial data is fed to a remote personal computer through the wireless Zig Bee network that represents the concept of distant wireless metering, practically involving no manpower. The paper also presents a software solution developed for total electrical energy billing and data management system

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A Novel Three phase Energy Meter Model with Wireless data reading and online Billing solution

INTRODUCTION
This paper describes a complete three phase wireless Energy Meter Reading system (WEMR)an integrated and programmable meter reading and management system which can give us perfect measurement of parameters wirelessly. WEMR is a specific application of automatic Meter Reading (AMR) where the remote collection of consumption data are done from customers utility meters over telecommunication, radio, power-line and other links [1]. The Electronic energy meters used for this system, are able to handle higher currents, have low power consumption and stable over time and temperature. They dont have gears that wear out or magnets that saturate with dc current. Electronic meters more easily enable new functionalities such as multi-tariff billing, tamper proofing, load shedding, power outage detection and power factor detection [2]. These offer flexibility of design, and can easily be reconfigured and updated. They have easy and stable calibration without hardware adjustment and are simpler to manufacture, transport, and install. This system can also reduce the total number of meters in a particular area if necessary. AMR is where the communication link is complete from the meter to the utility headquarters [3]. The automatic meter-reading systems may employ distributed structure, which consists of meters, sensors, intelligent terminals, management centre and wireless communication network [4]. The meter reading and management processes are free from human errors. Accuracy, speed, efficiency, reliability and cost effectiveness are the usual benefits achieved using this system. This system also gives special advantages over the traditional metering system such as the eradication of manual meter reading costs, improvement of customer services by reducing the maltreatment of data, replacement of difficulties like involvement of distance and accessibility of measurement points. With the advancement of new modern computer technologies, chances for more well-organized management of electric power distribution are there. The increasing importance of more accurate energy measurement data and real-time access to that data is accelerating acceptance of the digital metering technology [5]. The data communication is an important part of the AMR system. To evaluate the type of communications network needed to
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A Novel Three phase Energy Meter Model with Wireless data reading and online Billing solution carry metering data it is necessary to review the type of customer infrastructures that could be interfaced to such a network [6]. The primary role of the WEMR systems is to provide daily usage, total usage and real time usage data to the consumers. As for the automation of the power distribution system, its development and practical application have become an urgent task to achieve efficient and reliable operation of equipment. For the successfully wireless data transmission, in this paper the ZigBee specification is utilized. There has been increased interest in the ZigBee standard, in particular for building automation and industrial controls since its release in 2004 [7]. Though the specification was available publicly in 2005, people prefer using this standard among different wireless protocol for diversified applications. In [8], an agent based wireless local positioning system with ZigBee technology is proposed, mainly for factory level applications. A cost effective ZigBee-based wireless mine supervising system with early-warning intelligence on methane, temperature, humidity in mining area is proposed in [9]. Again, another article [10] presents the development of a system integrated to a ZigBee network to measure the whole human body vibration, for the persons exposed to vibratory environment. ZigBee specification is incorporated by many manufacturers in their devices because of its low power consumption and decreasing development cost. In the work presented here, Chip on make CC2430 product is used for transmitting and receiving data wirelessly from a three-phase energy meter.

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A Novel Three phase Energy Meter Model with Wireless data reading and online Billing solution

DESCRIPTION OF THE SCHEME

The developed system can be divided into three sections. First is a hardware based chipset solution of Energy meter that measures real-time active power from any three phase based system. Second part is the data transmission, where a number of meter reading data can be transferred through a wireless ZigBee based network to a remote server. The third part is the user friendly improved data management system based on software with two separate access support one for consumer and another for the electric supply company. The first two sections are shown in a block diagram in Fig. 1. The separate sections are described briefly below.

Figure 1. General Block Diagram of the Scheme

A. Energy meter The analog IC chip ADE 7754 is the heart of this hardware system. It is a high accuracy polyphone electrical energy measurement chip with a serial interface, suitable for active power
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A Novel Three phase Energy Meter Model with Wireless data reading and online Billing solution measurement from 3-phase/4-wire, 3-phase/3-wire or 4- wire delta system. The three phase supply voltages are fed directly to the chip and three line currents are fed through current transformers (CT). CTs are used here to get high current, low power performance. Burden resistors are used across the CTs which are calculated from the maximum current value and the number of turns in the CT. Ant aliasing filters (RC LPF) are required at the input terminals to prevent possible distortion due to the sampling in the ADC. The analog ground plane and digital ground plane are physically separated from each other and are connected only at one point. ADE7754 calibration is done using the registers through the SPI interface.[11]. All data transfer operations are synchronized to a serial clock input SCLK provided through a crystal oscillator of 10 MHz frequency. Data is shifted out of the chip at the DOUT logic output on a rising edge of SCLK. The CS input should be driven low for the entire data transfer operation. The functional block diagram of AD7754 is shown from the data sheet [11] in Fig. 2.

Figure 2. Functional internal Diagram of the IC ADE7751 B. Data transmission through ZigBee network The main characteristics of ZigBee network are simple implementation, low power consumption, low cost interface, redundancy of devices, high node density per physical layer (PHY) and medium access control layer (MAC). Besides, they
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A Novel Three phase Energy Meter Model with Wireless data reading and online Billing solution allow the network to work with a great number of active devices. ZigBee is based on IEEE 802.15.4 standard in terms of the PHY and MAC layers [12]. IEEE 802.15.4 defines two kinds of devices: the Full Function Device (FFD) and the Reduced Function Device (RFD). The FFD has the function to coordinate the network and consequently has access to all other devices. The RFD is limited to a star topology configuration, not being able to work as a network coordinator, so it does not have all the protocol services.

The FFD and RFD devices can operate in three different ways at the ZigBee standard as the ZigBee coordinator (ZC), ZigBee Router (ZR), or ZigBee End Device (ZED) [12]. The network layer supports three topologies: star, cluster tree and mesh as shown in Fig. 3. A star topology consists of a coordinating node and of one or more FFD or RFD which communicates with the ZC. At the cluster tree, the final devices can be associated to the network by the ZC and the ZR helping the increasing of number of nodes and the network scope. At the mesh topology, the FFD can distribute messages directly to other FFD. To enter the network, each device receives an address given by ZC or a ZR. The meter reading system adopts a distributed structure according to its characters. The system consists of data collector, wireless communication networks and the server system. Digital meter data is transmitted through two separate boards i.e. ZigBee transmission module to the data collector module. The ZigBee true System-on-Chip CC2430 is suitable for the purpose. It combines the excellent performance of the leading CC2420 RF transceiver with an industrystandard enhanced 8051 MCU, 32/64/128 KB flash memory, 8 KB RAM and many other powerful features. [13] It has low noise, low power consumption.

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A Novel Three phase Energy Meter Model with Wireless data reading and online Billing solution

Figure 3. Different topologies of ZigBee network The data collection rate (may be every an hour) can be adjusted according to the system requirement. The data collector is also a ZigBee gateway which is also a protocol conversion used to transform data package. The data package is transformed from ZigBee protocol to TCP/IP protocol before transmitting. So, the data collector sends the meter data to the receiver server through internet TCP/IP protocol.

The socket client /server programming plays major role in case of long distance transmission. In the Fig. 4 a ZigBee wireless sensor communication network scheme is shown where a multiple data from energy meters installed at different location are transferred to the data base server. In case of short distance (within the range of ZigBee network i.e. 100 meter [14]) the data collector is interfaced with a PC through RS-232 or USB (shown in the diagram Fig.1).

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A Novel Three phase Energy Meter Model with Wireless data reading and online Billing solution

Figure 4. Long distance EM reading through ZigBee network

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A Novel Three phase Energy Meter Model with Wireless data reading and online Billing solution

DATA MANAGEMENT SOFTWARE

The software developed here is to make an interactive, reliable and transparent relationship between the consumer and the electric supply agency. The system software is made using Visual Basic[15] which helps to form graphical user interface.

Figure 5. Consumer access starting window. The program developed reads the data through the ZigBee receiver and gives the corresponding energy reading continuously, similar to a connected conventional electromechanical meter. The software also gives user the opportunity of automatic billing i.e. the software makes the bill based on the current energy reading and the standard rates of energy consumption given by the Energy Board. At any time, the consumers can verify the meter reading, current billing information, next due date, the other facilities as provided by the electric supply agency from their internet connected computer by simply typing its unique consumer ID and password as shown in the window (Fig. 5). The electric supply agency can also see the status of its any consumer without physically sending its employees there. This is the main benefit of this software. The electric supply agency also can access the individual consumers information by its own password and user name. A sample of the information window is shown in Fig. 6.

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A Novel Three phase Energy Meter Model with Wireless data reading and online Billing solution

Figure 6. Consumer information window. One database management is here which gives us the facility to store and access data, and also helps us to process those data. This data base shows the current billing information of different consumers. This database helps in the monthly billing preparation. In this single database window the consumers details like name, address, consumer number, meter number, meter type are stored. This database window shown in the Fig.7 opts for administrator only and no change is possible by the consumer.

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A Novel Three phase Energy Meter Model with Wireless data reading and online Billing solution

Fig.7. Consumer database. There is also a Billing Information window in general, corresponds to the unit rates of energy under different levels of monthly consumption. As the unit rate varies normally with type of consumer, this is developed for five category of consumers viz. domestic, commercial, institute, public utility service and private hospitals/ educational institute. Though the access to this window is available for both consumer and administrator, only the administrator has the option to change the rates of the unit consumption. Again, the administrator can add new consumer to the database based on their valid consumer number through the user-friendly data entry window.

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A Novel Three phase Energy Meter Model with Wireless data reading and online Billing solution

CONCLUSION
Developing this wireless energymeter-reading system is not only to have high accuracy over a wide power range, better reliability and robustness but also to face the weakening competence in meter reading in increasingly over crowded localities and remote places. In order to accommodate the advanced requirements, not available in electromechanical meters, this allelectronic solution will be well accepted by the Electric distribution companies. The data like reactive power, apparent power and power factor with sign also can be sensed through this network by simply tracking the internal register of the chip. With the system described, customer service is improved through remote and automated meter reading, more credible utility bills and efficient data management. New features such as multi-tariff billing, power quality monitoring and reactive energy management are also possible in this system to improve generation, distribution, customer service and billing. Tampering in energy measurement as well as line to earth fault do not affect the accuracy in measurement and also can be diagnosed easily. This will not only help the service providers of power to offload the manpower, trouble to collect energy meter readings and organizing bill preparation, but also provide consumers an online tracking system to regulate the energy consumption intelligently.

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A Novel Three phase Energy Meter Model with Wireless data reading and online Billing solution

REFERENCES
[1] Sridharan, K., and Schulz, N.: Outage Management Through AMR Systems Using an Intelligent Data Filter, IEEE Trans. Power Delivery, 2001, 16(4), pp. 669-675. [2] http://www.analog.com,accessed Sep2010 [3] Holmes, J., and Campbell, D.: Communicating with domestic electricity

meters,Schlumberger Industries UK, pp. 129-133. [4] Cao, L., Tian, J., and Zhang, D.: Networked Remote Meter-Reading System Based on Wireless Communication Technology, Proc. IEEE Int. Conf. Information Acquisition, China, 2006, pp. 172-176. [5] Maity,T., Das, S., and Datta, B.: A PC based Intelligent Wireless Energy Metering and Online Billing Solution for Domestic Consumers, Institution of Engineers (India) Journal (ET), 2009, 89, pp. 8-12. [6] [6] Newbury, J., and Miller,W.: Multiprotocol Routing for Automatic Remote Meter Reading Using Power Line Carrier Systems, IEEE Power Delivery, 2001, 16(14), pp. 1-4. [7] [7] Egan. D.: The Emergence of ZigBee in building automation and industrial controls, IEE Computing & Control Engineering. 2005, 16(2), pp. 14-19. [8] [8] Chan, H. K.: Agent-Based Factory Level Wireless Local Positioning System with ZigBee Technology, IEEE Systems Journal, 2010, 4(2), pp. 179-85. [9] [9] Qiang, C., Ping, S. J., Zhe, Z., and Fan, Z.: ZigBee Based Intelligent Helmet for Coal Miners, IEEE World Congress on Computer Science and Information Engineering, 2009, pp. 433-35. [10] [10] Koenig, D.,Chiaramonte, M.S., and Balbinot, A.: Wireless Network for Measurement of Whole-Body Vibration, Sensors, 2008, 8, pp. 3067-81. [11] [11] http://www.analog.com,accessed Sept 2010. [12] [12]http://www.citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download, accessed August 2010.
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A Novel Three phase Energy Meter Model with Wireless data reading and online Billing solution

[13] [13] http://www.focus.ti.com/docs/prod.html,accessed Sept 2010. [14] [14] Lee, J., Su, Y., and Shen, C.: A Comparative Study of Wireless Protocols. Bluetooth, UWB, ZigBee, and Wi-Fi, Proc. 33rd Annual Conf. IEEE Industrial Electronics Society, Taiwan, 2007, pp. 46-51. [15] [15] Gottfried, B.S.: Schaums outline of theory and Problems of Programming with Visual Basic, (Tata Mcgraw Hill, 1st edn, 2002), pp. 01-50.

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