IoT in Electrical power Sector
The demand for electrical power is increasing with each passing day.
Electrical power companies need innovative ways of increasing the efficiency of the power system; right from generation to distribution of electricity.
An electrical power system, also known as a power grid, consists of :
- power generation system using turbines
- transmission system to transmit the power to load centers
- distribution system to supply the power from load centers to consumers after lowering the voltage.
SCADA (Supervisory Control And Data Acquisition) system is used in power grids to connect different sub-stations to a central control unit.
This system has been evolving for a long time to allow centralized control and monitoring of different generation and transmission stations. IoT is the latest development in the SCADA system.
It connects the different devices and sensors to the internet so that real-time data can be received by the central control unit.
IoT enabled SCADA improves the efficiency of the power system, reduces the cost of manual labour by automating tasks, reduces the downtime due to power outages by facilitating quick fault detection and also reduces the frequency of faults by continuous monitoring.
Some of the other areas where IoT is used in the electrical power industry (IoT applications in Power sector) are
Smart meters
Smart meters are installed at the consumer’s location to capture usage information and transmit it to the power company regularly.
The consumer can see the latest and accurate billing and usage information whereas power companies can improve customer satisfaction by providing flexible payment options.
This can also help in reducing losses and theft of electricity.
See More : Smart Meters :New way of measuring the consumption
Smart grid
The smart meters are connected to a smart grid. The smart grid can identify, in real-time, areas which are using more power or areas which are using less power.
This information can be used to manage power generation stations in accordance with the usage. Smart grids can also help with real-time identification and correction of faults in the grid using IoT.
See more : What is the Smart Grid? and its importance n benefits
Home automation
Another area where IoT is used in the electrical power industry is Home Automation as discussed in smart Home and Smart building technologies.
Consumers can control the electricity usage in their homes by using IoT to turn their home appliances on or off based on their usage and surrounding conditions.
See also : 7 Top Tips for Taking Advantage of Your New Smart Home
By using sensors on the equipment in the electricity grid, the state of the equipment can be continuously monitored automatically.
This information can be used to determine when the equipment needs maintenance and what is the best time for performing the maintenance based on when the equipment has the least usage. This results in the least impact on the customers on account of maintenance work.
The electrical power industry is one of the oldest and established industries in the world.
With the progress of IoT technologies, the traditional systems are being updated to make the electrical power system more efficient and help reduce the end cost of electricity.
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