Smart Grid Initiative - A Pilot Study

POWERGRID jointly with Electricity Department, Govt. of Puducherry has developed Pilot Smart Grid project in Puducherry through open collaboration. About 60 organizations participated to implement Pilot Smart Grid project. This project is unique in the manner in which all major attributes of Smart Grid viz. Advanced Metering Infrastructure (AMI), Outage Management System (OMS), Peak Load Management (PLM), Power Quality Management (PQM),Renewable Integration with grid and so on have been implemented with the objective to demonstrate the technology efficacy, help in formulation of standardization, framing of technical specifications and interoperability framework of various technologies etc. Smart Grid relies heavily on underlying communication technologies. The Pilot has five communication technologies in operation viz. GPRS, RF 2.4 GHz, RF 865 MHz, Narrow band PLC and Broad band PLC.

This paper outlines the objectives and mode of implementation of the project, highlights benefits of major attributes and compares performance of different communication technologies in the Indian context.