Awareness on Power consumption is becoming vital these days. The proposed system is made up of postpaid billing system which uses GSM (Global System for Mobile Communication) to provide effective and efficient power meter reading, usage notification and distribution through wireless communication. The postpaid meter is important in making the consumer having sense about his/her energy consumption which is important in eliminating the difficulties facing the electrical utility employee in getting the reading of the conventional electromechanical meter and eliminating any error incurred in bills issuing. The designed digital meter consists of GSM module, a microcontroller, a digital meter & a wireless gateway. This proposed prototype of energy metering system comprises of two main parts; clients and server. A GSM module is used to read the ID of the SIM (Subscriber Identification Module) card. The server is located in the local substation which receives the SIM ID from clients and sends ID’s information back to the client after checking and/or updating the database. Moreover the system also display the amount of energy consumed on the LCD (Liquid Crystal Display).
The aim of the Research Project is to develop a system which uses microcontroller as a central part to provide postpaid services, and it uses GSM to update the WAPDA (Water and Power Development Authority Pakistan) about the unit consumed with time and date. So that consumer will be aware of their usage and for provider’s error occur and resources use can be reduced.
Abstract
Awareness on Power consumption is becoming vital these days. The proposed system is made up of postpaid billing system which uses GSM (Global System for Mobile Communication) to provide effective and efficient power meter reading, usage notification and distribution through wireless communication. The postpaid meter is important in making the consumer having sense about his/her energy consumption which is important in eliminating the difficulties facing the electrical utility employee in getting the reading of the conventional electromechanical meter and eliminating any error incurred in bills issuing. The designed digital meter consists of GSM module, a microcontroller, a digital meter & a wireless gateway. This proposed prototype of energy metering system comprises of two main parts; clients and server. A GSM module is used to read the ID of the SIM (Subscriber Identification Module) card. The server is located in the local substation which receives the SIM ID from clients and sends ID’s information back to the client after checking and/or updating the database. Moreover the system also display the amount of energy consumed on the LCD (Liquid Crystal Display).
The aim of the Research Project is to develop a system which uses microcontroller as a central part to provide postpaid services, and it uses GSM to update the WAPDA (Water and Power Development Authority Pakistan) about the unit consumed with time and date. So that consumer will be aware of their usage and for provider’s error occur and resources use can be reduced.
Key Words
Energy Meter, CT (Current Transformer), PT (Potential Transformer), RTC (Real Time Clock) GSM Module, Substation, WAPDA
Introduction
An energy meter is a device that is able to measure electric energy at any instant of time. The data on energy consumption is very important for the study about energy demand especially on domestic loads. But the meters in paste were very expensive because of the expensive hardware such as CTs & PTs installed in it. It therefore, was the need of the day to design such a meter that could efficiently measure the electrical energy consumed by home appliances such as electric irons electric kettle, motors, television, lighting loads etc, and thus the Digital Energy meter was developed. Some of the main features of this meter is that its robust, user friendly and informative enough for the purpose of simple data collection.
In this research project I have designed & interfaced the hardware with the microcontroller. In this hardware design, the energy consumed is determined in a digital form. The main role of the microcontroller is to execute the output signal on the soft code specially written to calculate energy cost and to convert digital energy signals to binary code decimal (BCD). The total energy consumption done by the appliances and its cost charged is displayed on the liquid crystal display (LCD) [1].
For a customer to pay the electricity bill, he/she should install an energy meter that measures the amount of electrical energy consumed by the customer. This meter needs to be calibrated and sealed so that the client cannot mess with its hardware. The meter has to be read instantly and then the data collected will be processed and a bill will be issued. This bill will be sent on the client’s address in order to pay it [2]. Moreover, the Distribution companies (Discos) are facing many problems in terms of technical & non-technical losses. They are unable to keep track of the changing maximum demand for domestic consumers [3]. The above mentioned process requires employers to collect data, issue bills and distribute them [4], collect money, facing cash money carrying risk and other troubles which might be encountered. All these above stated problems can be resolved by making use of this new technology called the digital energy metering.
The main objective of prototype is to design digital meter which is capable of providing the postpaid services. This system uses microcontroller as a central part to provide the features like real time monitoring of the units measurement, and display the units consumed on LCD. So that at the end of month one can have the information about the units consumed with proper date and time of units consumed.
The scope of this work includes using, assembly to program microcontroller, build hardware for the system, and interface the hardware to microcontroller and different electronics components like LCD, GSM module etc [5][6][7][8][9].
Physical Modelling & Hardware Implementation Process
Block Diagram
Before implementing the circuit diagram block diagram should be made for the sake of simplicity, so that later on circuit diagram is easy to be made, figure given below that microcontroller is the central part of project, it controlling the processes like, how much units were consumed, sending units consumed information to the WAPDA with date and time, controlling and displaying the information on LCD. C.T is used to measure the current drawn by the load through ADC (Analog to Digital Converter), and displaying the information on LCD. Where RTC (Real Time Clock) is used for the date and time of units consumed.
illustration not visible in this excerpt
Figure.1 Block Diagram
Circuit Diagram
Before implementing the hardware, circuit diagram should be made so that it is easy to implement the hardware and in case of any error it should be removed easily.
A circuit diagram shows the connection between all the components and interfaces with controller. Starting from the regulator, this is used to provide a smooth 5V DC voltage, which is used to operate microcontroller, GSM module, LCD, ADC etc.
The circuit shown below is shows the interfacing of all the components with each other, the microcontroller is used as a central part which is controlling all the process. Port 1 is interfaced with the ADC which measure the current drawn by load, on the basis of that units will be count and display it on LCD, the LCD is interfaced with port 0. Where all the information of the units consumed will be sanded through GSM module which is interfaced with pin 10 and 11 of the controller. Where RTC is used to send the exact time and date of units consumed. Where the interfacing of all the components with each other is given in below figure.
illustration not visible in this excerpt
Figure.2 Circuit Diagram
[...]
- Quote paper
- Muhammad Junaid (Author), 2015, Digital Energy Metering with Real Time Reading & Monitoring by using GSM Technology, Munich, GRIN Verlag, https://www.grin.com/document/289192