Information and communication technologies (ICT) represent a fundamental element in the growth and performance of smart grids. A sophisticated, reliable and fast communication infrastructure is, in fact, necessary for the connection among the huge amount of distributed elements, such as generators, substations, energy storage systems and users, enabling a real time exchange of data and information necessary for the management of the system and for ensuring improvements in terms of efficiency, reliability, flexibility and investment return for all those involved in a smart grid: producers, operators and customers. This paper overviews the issues related to the smart grid architecture from the perspective of potential applications and the communications requirements needed for ensuring performance, flexible operation, reliability and economics.

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A Survey on Smart Grid Potential Applications and Communication Requirements

Economics and environmental incentives, as well as advances in technology, are reshaping the traditional view of industrial systems. The anticipation of a large penetration of plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) and plug-in electric vehicles (PEVs) into the market brings up many technical problems that are highly related to industrial information technologies within the next ten years. There is a need for an in-depth understanding of the electrification of transportation in the industrial environment. It is important to consolidate the practical and the conceptual knowledge of industrial informatics in order to support the emerging electric vehicle (EV) technologies. This paper presents a comprehensive overview of the electrification of transportation in an industrial environment. In addition, it provides a comprehensive survey of the EVs in the field of industrial informatics systems, namely: 1) charging infrastructure and PHEV/PEV batteries; 2) intelligent energy management; 3) vehicle-to-grid; and 4) communication requirements. Moreover, this paper presents a future perspective of industrial information technologies to accelerate the market introduction and penetration of advanced electric drive vehicles.

A Survey on the Electrification of Transportation in a Smart Grid Environment

With the arrival of smart grid era and the advent of advanced communication and information infrastructures, bidirectional communication, advanced metering infrastructure, energy storage systems and home area networks would revolutionize the patterns of electricity usage and energy conservation at the consumption premises. Coupled with the emergence of vehicle-to-grid technologies and massive distributed renewable energy, there is a profound transition for the energy management pattern from the conventional centralized infrastructure towards the autonomous responsive demand and cyber-physical energy systems with renewable and stored energy sources. Under the sustainable smart grid paradigm, the smart house with its home energy management system (HEMS) plays an important role to improve the efficiency, economics, reliability, and energy conservation for distribution systems. In this paper, a brief overview on the architecture and functional modules of smart HEMS is presented. Then, the advanced HEMS infrastructures and home appliances in smart houses are thoroughly analyzed and reviewed. Furthermore, the utilization of various building renewable energy resources in HEMS, including solar, wind, biomass and geothermal energies, is surveyed. Lastly, various home appliance scheduling strategies to reduce the residential electricity cost and improve the energy efficiency from power generation utilities are also investigated.

Smart home energy management systems: Concept, configurations, and scheduling strategies

This paper focuses on the role of networked microgrids as distributed systems for enhancing the power system resilience against extreme events. Resilience is an intrinsically complex property which requires deep understanding of microgrid operation in order to respond effectively in emergency conditions. The paper first introduces the definition and offers a generic framework for analyzing the power system resilience. The notion that large power systems can achieve a higher level of resilience through the deployment of networked microgrids is discussed in detail. In particular, the management of networked microgrids for riding through extreme events is analyzed. In addition, the merits of advanced information and communication technologies (ICTs) in microgrid-based distributed systems that can support the power system resilience are presented. The paper also points out the challenges for expanding the role of distributed systems and concludes that networked microgrids in particular provide a universal solution for improving the resilience against extreme events in Smart Cities.

Networked Microgrids for Enhancing the Power System Resilience

Traditional power grids are being transformed into smart grids (SGs) to address the issues in the existing power system due to uni-directional information flow, energy wastage, growing energy demand, reliability, and security. SGs offer bi-directional energy flow between service providers and consumers, involving power generation, transmission, distribution, and utilization systems. SGs employ various devices for the monitoring, analysis, and control of the grid, deployed at power plants, distribution centers, and in consumers' premises in a very large number. Hence, an SG requires connectivity, automation, and the tracking of such devices. This is achieved with the help of the Internet of Things (IoT). The IoT helps SG systems to support various network functions throughout the generation, transmission, distribution, and consumption of energy by incorporating the IoT devices (such as sensors, actuators, and smart meters), as well as by providing the connectivity, automation, and tracking for such devices. In this paper, we provide a comprehensive survey on the IoT-aided SG systems, which includes the existing architectures, applications, and prototypes of the IoT-aided SG systems. This survey also highlights the open issues, challenges, and future research directions for the IoT-aided SG systems.

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Internet of Things-Aided Smart Grid: Technologies, Architectures, Applications, Prototypes, and Future Research Directions

The recent worldwide measures for energy savings call for a larger awareness of the household energy consumption, given the relevant contribution of domestic load to the national energy balance. On the other hand, electricity smart meters together with gas, heat, and water meters can be interconnected in a large network offering a potential value to implement energy savings and other energy-related services, as long as an efficient interface with the final user is implemented. Unfortunately, so far, the interface of such devices is mostly designed and addressed at the utilities supervising the system, giving them relevant advantages, while the communication with the household is often underestimated. This paper addresses this topic by proposing the definition of a local interface for smart meters, by looking at the actual European Union and international regulations, at the technological solutions available on the market, and at those implemented in different countries, and, finally, by proposing specific architectures for a proper consumer-oriented implementation of a smart meter network.

Electricity Smart Meters Interfacing the Households

In full electric (EV) or hybrid electric (HEV) vehicles the onboard communication is a crucial issue, that can take advantage from a reliable and robust interaction among the embedded units (ECUs) providing among others the power and batteries management, services, accessories and supervision; an updated global view of the system under control (the car) can improve the quality of control, reliability, safety and comfort. Power Line Communication technology (PLC), that take advantage of the DC power line as a physical medium to exchange messages, according to standard protocols, is a candidate at substituting the actual wired solutions, by substantially reducing the cabling burden. The present paper aims at i) reviewing PLC technology for DC bus in the automotive sector; ii) defining the requirements of a reliable communication systems within a car environment, with special attention given to the data exchange needed by the more critical systems in EV and HEV, and namely the control of electrical actuators for traction; iii) describing a benchmark for testing the data transfer characteristics and performance, including details on proposed protocols and architectures and presenting experimental results on data channel characterization and transmission.

Powerline communication in electric vehicles

The power line technology has received an increasing attention in the last decades due to its inherent benefits, mainly related to the reduction of cabling and associated costs. Power line communication (PLC) was first employed in power utilities and since the 80s in home automation, too. However, its use in the automotive field received relatively little attention. This paper revisits the related work in using PLC technology for communication within the automotive domain and outlines its possible benefits. Then, it focuses on the issues that need to be addressed when introducing the PLC in the automotive domain. The final goal of this work is to carry out a practical assessment of the PLC technology in the referred domain that may open the way for future use in industrial scale.

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Towards the powerline alternative in automotive applications

This paper deals with the hybrid position/force control of a class of robotic manipulators. To perform the control scheme design, it is necessary to characterize the dynamical model of the force sensor which is mounted at the end-effector of the robot. The objective is to perform reliable contact force measurements by estimating all the forces which are generated at the level of the tip which is directly connected to the sensor. A dynamical model of the sensor motion is formulated and identified, by considering also the kinematics of the robot. The proposed hybrid control scheme includes position and force controllers based on first and second order sliding modes. These kind of controllers guarantee suitable robustness properties to perform a satisfactory trajectory tracking, also allowing one to make the robot move in an environment with unknown obstacles by using the possibility of touching the obstacles as a way to pass them by. Experimental tests are performed on a COMAU SMART3-S2 anthropomorphic rigid robot manipulator with an ATI Gamma force sensor by comparing four different position/force control schemes.

Hybrid position/force sliding mode control of a class of robotic manipulators

The Industrial Internet of Thing (IIoT) approach to an Industry plant design, devises a comprehensive interconnection of the system components, from sections up to single devices, in order to get a general and punctual understanding of the process. Such an intelligent network, mostly based on Ethernet basic layers, when properly conceived, should be able to add relevant value to the plant operation. This paper shows how, within the IIoT frame topics, the plant efficiency can be addressed and bring relevant improvement. The reason is that variables directly related to the energy consumption, such as current, electric power, actuator and motor torque, speed, etc., can be timely and easily monitored in the entire plant, since they are already conveyed on the network, due to real time control and diagnostics purpose. A power consumption diagram can be derived, and give hints on how to optimize operations, based on some efficiency index. It is quite easy to show how this approach converges with the Industry 4.0 paradigm. The paper, after a general discussion, proves it with a practical example based on a Gantry robot, driven in an EtherCAT based automation network.

Francesco Benzi

Papers

Electricity Smart Meters Interfacing the Households

Powerline communication in electric vehicles

Towards the powerline alternative in automotive applications

Hybrid position/force sliding mode control of a class of robotic manipulators

IIoT based efficiency monitoring of a Gantry robot