Wireless Solutions for Smart Grid deployments

Alok Sharma, Aviat Networks

Agenda1. Introduction

– Smart Grid Communication Tiers & Design Goals

2. Microwave (PTP) Backhaul– Bridging Tier 1 and Tier 2 Communication Layers

3. Tier 2 (PMP) Communication Layer– Requirements & Technology Choice

4. Tier 3 Communication Layer– TV Whitespace

5. Self Organizing Networks (SON)- Managing network complexity

6. Closing Remarks

Smart Grid Communication TiersFiber or

Microwave/High BandwidthHAN

Tier 4

RF/Low Bandwidth

Tier 3

RF/Med Bandwidth

Tier 2

Tier 1

Source: Doug McGinnis, Exelon Business Services - UTC Telecom 2010

Communications – Design Goals1. Security

– Aligned with industry best practices (FIPS 140-2 compliant or certified)

2. Converged Communications – Converged communications infrastructure with logical isolation of services

(tunneling)

3. Interoperable– Utilize industry standard open (IP) protocols

4. Privately Owned Communications– Enable governance and control over all aspects of the technology

5. No Unanalyzed Single Points of Failure(Self Healing)– No unanalyzed single points of failure– Failure modes and backup schemes to form a “self healing” architecture

6. Maintenance, Management & Monitoring– Maintain, monitor and control network devices.

Focu

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Source: Doug McGinnis, Exelon Business Services - UTC Telecom 2010

MICROWAVE (PTP) BACKHAULBRIDGING TIER 1 AND TIER 2 COMMUNICATION LAYERS

Smart Grid Places Demands on Legacy Microwave Systems

1. Many new IP endpoints2. Support converged MPLS transport

network3. Security (authentication, intrusion

detection, encryption etc.)4. QoS Requirements: traffic under

emergency situations5. New remote sites and coverage areas6. Overall capacity demands

TDM-based Microwave

Systems Need Upgrading

for Smart Grid

What are the options?

Critical to put foundation in place to build smart grid upon

Landscape: Network Migration Plans and Today’s Microwave Systems

All TDM Today

TDM IP

Network migration path

TDM ONLY Radio• Legacy systems• Optimized for TDM• Not designed for IP –

poor packet efficiency

IP ONLY Radios• Built to carry IP• Typically no native

TDM (forces use of yet to be fully tested Pseudo wire)

Region of Effectiveness

Region of Effectiveness

HYBRID Radio• Native TDM, Native IP

transport for effective migration to IP

Hybrid Microwave RadioHYBRID Microwave Radio Enables Seamless Migration from TDM to ALL-IP Future

Hybrid simultaneously enables:1. TDM2. IP3. Emulated TDM over IPOR any combination of the three

HYBRID Microwave Radios combine traditional microwave requirements

with new IP features – all in a single platform

HYBRID Radio

FlexibleBandwidthAllocation

Native TDM

Native IP

TDM IP/Ethernet

PWE

Integrated P

seudowire

Tier 2 (PMP) Communication LayerREQUIREMENTS & TECHNOLOGY CHOICE

Tier 2 Communication Layer - Requirements

• Tier 2 communication layer is Point-to-Multipoint (PMP) network that bridges Field Area Network (FAN) to the backbone network.

• Key Requirements:– Wireless (economics & ease of installation)– IP based (Open Standards)– Broadband (High Spectral Efficiency – OFDMA, MIMO, Beam Forming)– Mobility/Portability (workforce automation)

• 2 leading technology choices– WiMAX– LTE (and 3G)

Question: Which technology to select for Smart Grid?

Tier 2 Communication Layer – Technology Choice

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3G &

LTE

Evol

ution 1. LTE infrastructure includes legacy

support for: • GSM, GPRS, EDGE, EGPRS, IS95,

CDMA 1xRTT, CDMA 1xEVDO, WCDMA, HSPA, HSPA+, IMS, LTE R8, R9, R10

2. Legacy support adds tremendously to LTE infrastructure & device complexity leading to significantly higher CapEx & OpEx

3. WiMAX is purpose built for 4G Mobile Broadband and does NOT have any legacy issues.

4. WiMAX infrastructure and devices have significantly lower CapEx & OpEx

WiMAX is the recommended technology choice

TIER 3 COMMUNICATION LAYERTV WHITESPACE

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What is TV Whitespace?

Source: C. R. Stevenson, G. Chouinard, W. Caldwell:“Recommended Practice for the Installation and Deployment of IEEE 802.22 Systems,” IEEE802, San Diego, CA, 7/17/06

White space

IEEE 802.22 – TV Whitespace Standard• Sub-GHz frequency band with excellent

propagation characteristics- 100x reach of WiFi (30km vs. 300m)

• Ideal for AMI and Sensor data collection- Simple & Predictable Single Hop Tier

3 layer vs. Complex and Unpredictable Mesh architectures

• Technically, similar to WiMAX• Interference mitigation via

co-ordination with FCC database & spectrum sensing

(Source: IEEE)

TV Band White Spaces

- Very little channel overlap between neighboring metro areas- Lots of white space in between licensed channels

16

TVWS Bandwidth Available

17

Source: Free Press and New American Foundation

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SELF ORGANIZING NETWORKS (SON)MANAGING NETWORK COMPLEXITY

Future Wireless Networks: New H-RAN Architecture

MACRO: Solving initialcoverage issue; Existing networks

FEMTO: solving home and enterprise coverage & capacity issues

PICO: Solving street, home and enterprise coverage & capacity issues

Hierarchical RAN (H-RAN) = macro overlay + clusters of small cells

10x Lower COST/Mb

10x CAPACITY Improvement

Near 100%COVERAGE

Results

Lots of configuration parameters3G and 4G technologies have more than 100 parameters each to be configured just for the RF:• Some of them are

vendor specific• Some of them are

project specific

Pico/Femto cells bring completely new dynamics into the wireless

network deployments

Adding new site to the 3G/4G networkActivity

Effort(MD – Man

Days)New site verification 1

On site visit: site details verification 0.5

On site visit: RF survey 0.5

New site RF plan 2

Neighbors, frequency, preamble/scrambling code plan

0.5

Interference analyses on surrounding sites 0.5

Capacity analyses 0.5

Handover analyses 0.5

Implementation on new node(s) 0.5

Field measurements and verification 2

Optimization 2

Total activities 7.5

5M Pico base stations in 2015:• 37.5M Man Days = ~103k Man Years

Challenges:• OpEx – 103k engineers@$100k = ~$11B +network planning tools + maps• Skilled Engineers – where to get 103k skilledengineers?• Networks Dynamics – add 5M base stations a year

If nothing changes – additional OpEx of >$11B

Source: ABI Research

SON Functionality

AIRAdaptive Interference Reduction- Dynamic scanning algorithm - Dynamic segment/channel selection - Scanning support for ANR formation- Decision based on MS measured data

NNINode-to-Node Interface

- Secure communication between cell sites & SON Server- Configuration predictions

- Optimal route selection based onvarious parameters

NCMNetwork Capacity Maximization- MIMO usage- Intelligent and Dynamic Automatic Neighbor cell list distribution- Enhanced Network Initiated Handover- Fractional Frequency Reuse

pHOPico Handover

- time critical decisions on SON

Agent - data intensive

statistics , predictions on the SON Server

- intra-Pico and Macro-Pico Handovers

SON SolutionSimplifies Operations by

removing manual planning, deployment and operations

Example 1: Congestion avoidance

In wireless access total available link budget/capacity changes dynamically:• Link quality of the existing MS changes• New MS joins the Base stationTotal possible throughput depends on the link quality->modulation used by each and every MS

Two parameters are constantly monitored:• Air interface utilization Uair

• Relative committed traffic rate Rrel

Example 1: Congestion avoidance (cont.)

All the parameters areconstantly monitored

When utilization crosses the trigger line one of the following actions is executed:• Neighbor lists of the neighbors are

changed• Network initiated HO is initiated

Example 2: Power savings - GreenSON

Utilizing mobile station behavior statistics, Base stations can be dynamically reconfigured (time of day, day of week) to reduce the total network power consumption

CLOSING REMARKS

Security: What is important?

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1. Stuxnet virus defeated all the typical defenses (digital certificates, firewall signature analysis …) defined by IEEE, 3GPP & FIPS specifications and deployed across current networks.

2. As electric grid becomes an extension of internet through Smart Grid initiatives, grid infrastructure security will become a paramount issue.

3. For further information, please read “Cyber War: The Next Threat to National Security and What to Do About It” by Richard Clarke & Robert Knake.

Source: WSJ, NY Times, eWeek

Thank You!