CASE STUDY

Anti-interference, low latency, low power consumption and easy evolution eLTE-DSA explores the age of wireless power IoT.

By Wei Ke-Tai, Huawei Enterprise Wireless Marketing Support Department

In our current and ongoing technology and industrial revolution, combined with accelerating urbanisation, industrial structures are being optimised and upgraded. In concert, the scale of the power grid continues to expand due to the integration of distributed energy, charging piles that help improve assurance capability, power supply reliability and power quality of urban distribution networks.

Governments the world over are working to promote an energy production and consumption revolution. The goal is to build a highly efficient, clean and environmentally friendly smart grid system that fully supports the construction of the modern energy system. One example is the EU 20-20-20 plan that seeks to increase energy efficiency 20% by 2020, reduce CO2 emissions 20% and increase the proportion of distributed renewable energy by 20%. Britain, Germany and France also have clear requirements for renewable energy and electric vehicles.

Power distribution automation coverage

Meanwhile in China, the National Energy Bureau has required the national power distribution automation coverage rate to be increased from 20% in 2014 to 90% in 2020.

As a result, with the grid-connection of these distributed systems and the scale placement of electric vehicles, the power grid source balance requires more timely visual load forecasting and more precise load control. To make this a reality, all power distribution terminals need to be connected and the communication network becomes the key and foundation.

In China, after years of development, the electric power private network has formed a backbone communication network mainly based on dedicated optical fiber communication networks. The dispatching control centers, high-voltage substations, office organisations and branches of China Unicom have been formed.

However, figuring out how to connect the power equipment in cities, industrial areas and rural areas to the network is a difficult problem for the comprehensive interconnection of the power grid.

Wireless network

Compared with optical fiber networks, wireless network deployment is more flexible. Wireless networks can be quickly deployed in old urban areas or in some private land areas, which can help meet the requirements of future capacity expansion. Considering the requirements of security, reliability, stability and fast response, the wireless private network solution becomes the inevitable choice for realising the "last mile" of the power communication network.

eLTE-DSA - wireless private network

According to the global spectrum, the UHF/VHF narrowband spectrum used in the traditional industry is the most easy to obtain band for use in electric power wireless private network construction. Traditional data radio stations on this frequency band use the 1G narrowband technology. Unfortunately, in terms of delay, throughput and device capacity, it is difficult to meet the requirements of more precise control, device expansion and service expansion for future smart grids with this spectrum.

To remedy this situation, Huawei launched the eLTE-DSA solution based on 4.5G and 5G evolution. With industry-leading RF and filtering capabilities and some 5G algorithms, Huawei's industry-leading RF and filtering capabilities aggregate UHF/VHF discrete narrowband spectrum resources and implements LTE technologies on the UHF/VHF discrete spectrum.

The advantages of this include anti-interference, low latency, low power consumption, easy evolution and easy expansion. It is the best choice for fully constructing the power IoT.

High-performance, secure and reliable

In terms of security and reliability, this solution is based on the most advanced and mature SingleRAN platform in the industry and has the strongest RF and narrowband filtering capabilities in the industry. In addition, the advanced algorithms such as frequency hopping and channel backup are introduced to ensure the coexistence of the UHF/VHF frequency band and the inter-RAT system ensures secure and reliable data transmission.

In terms of fast response, the eLTE-DSA adopts the 3GPP standard 10 ms ultra-short frame structure and introduces the 5G Grant free scheduling algorithm. These technologies achieve and guarantee latency below 20 ms in the downlink and a maximum 4000 connections per cell. This enables it to meet the requirements of low delay control such as precise load control in various complex radio environments.

In terms of service expansion, the static power consumption of the eLTE-DSA terminal module is less than 0.15w. Before the power distribution automation service, the eLTE-DSA terminal module can fully meet the requirements of power IoT applications such as intelligent meter reading and fault indicators. In terms of evolution, thanks to the standard 4.5G underlying protocol and the latest hardware platform, eLTE-DSA can continuously evolve to 5G to meet new requirements of electric power applications.

Standardisation and industrialisation process

In 2018, Huawei joined the State Grid to actively promote the eLTE-DSA standard and industrialisation process, making a number of achievements over time. In April, the national network and Huawei reached a consensus: the two parties would jointly build the industry's highest level and the world's leading wireless power IoT. The IoT-G 230MHz (eLTE-DSA technology) is included in the State Grid Corporation of China (SGCC) 230 enterprise standard. At the same time, Guodian and Huawei set up a joint innovation lab to conduct joint innovation based on eLTE-DSA and cooperate comprehensively in standards internationalisation, product and tool R&D, equipment and service testing.

In August 2018, Huawei successfully held the 2018 Power 230 Wireless Industry Conference in Chengdu. Thanks to its advanced technology, standard openness and Huawei's industry promotion capability, Huawei has helped multiple industry partners to develop eLTE-DSA (IoT-G 230MHz) products. These have, in turn, quickly built the industry ecosystem and helped to jointly promote the construction of the electric power wireless private network.

In addition, Huawei and SGCC actively promoted the internationalisation of the IoT-G standard (eLTE-DSA) and promoted the standards, technologies and successful experience of China's wireless private network to the world.

Huawei's fully-connected grid solution has served 13 of the world's Top 20 power companies and has been widely used in 73 countries worldwide, serving more than 190 electric power customers. Examples of companies it serves around the globe include the State Grid Corporation of China (SGCC), E.ON in Germany, and ENEL in Italy.

In the future, Huawei will continue to work and innovate in an open and cooperative manner. Huawei will work with electric power customers and the best partners to promote the development of the electric power wireless private network industry and jointly help the full-service ubiquitous power IoT construction. Furthermore, Huawei will promote the development of smart grids and the growth of the energy Internet to achieve digital transformation and upgrades across the entire industry.