Electricity meters: their construction and management. A practical manual for central station engineers, distribution engineers, and students.

Mode of access: Internet.

Business model: What should be the strategy used by Smart Galp to implement and potentiate its value proposition in the Portuguese market?

A Work Project, presented as part of the requirements for the Award of a Masters Degree in Management from the NOVA – School of Business and Economics

Avoimen AMR-palvelualustan tiedonsiirtomenetelmien selvitys ja analyysi

Sähköenergiamittareiden etälukuun (AMR) siirtyminen on kasvanut Suomessa, kuten muissakin Euroopan maissa viime vuosina merkittävästi. Tavoitteena on, että vuonna 2014 80 % kaikista Suomen sähköenergiamittareista olisi etäluettavia ja rekisteröisivät tunnittaiset kulutustiedot. AMR-tekniikan avulla voidaan toteuttaa myös muita palveluja kulutustietojen rekisteröinnin lisäksi. AMR-mittareiden etäluenta ja niiden kautta siirrettävät signaalit vaativat mittareilta tiedonsiirtotapoja. Työssä tarkastellaan TeliaSoneran AMR-palvelualustan ominaisuuksia ja arkkitehtuuria. Selvitetään AMR-mittareiden toiminnallisia vaatimuksia ja mahdollisia tiedonsiirtotapoja mittareiden ja etäluentajärjestelmän välillä. Arvioidaan näiden selvitysten perusteella ja myös kustannusten kannalta eri tiedonsiirtomenetelmien soveltuvuutta eri ympäristöihin. Lisäksi suoritetaan arviointi ja käytännön laboratoriotestauksia valitulle sähköverkkoa tiedonsiirrossa hyödyntävälle AMR-mittarille. Tavoitteena on selvittää ja analysoida vertailtavan mittarin yhteensopivuutta TeliaSoneran päätelaitteiden ja AMR-palvelualustan kanssa. Analysoidaan näiden tarkasteltavien mittareiden ominaisuuksia ja elinkaarta. Laboratoriotesteillä selvitetään myös tarkasteltavien sähköverkkotiedonsiirto AMRmittareiden häiriösietoisuutta verkossa esiintyviä häiriöitä vastaan. Näiden pohjalta tehdään johtopäätökset ja suositukset.

Siirtohinnoittelun kehittäminen etäluettavilta mittareilta saatavan datan avulla sähkönjakeluyhtiö Mäntsälän Sähkö Oy:lle

Sähkönsiirtomaksuilla katetaan luonnollisena alueellisena monopolina toimivan paikallisen sähkönjakeluyhtiön toiminta. Koska sähköverkkoyhtiöt toimivat monopoliasemassa, niiden toimintaa valvoo Energiavirasto. Energiavirasto valvoo pääasiassa verkkoyhtiöiden liikevaihtoa ja toiminnan tehokkuutta. Verkkoyhtiöiden toimintaa säätää Suomessa sähkömarkkinalaki. Verkkoyhtiöiden kustannusrakenne on hyvin sidottu verkoston kustannuksiin. Koska sähköverkoston kustannukset ovat pitkän käyttöiän ja suurien alkuinvestointien vuoksi vuosittain kiinteät ja merkittävän suuret, olisi verkkoyhtiön kannalta tärkeää, että vuosittaiset tulot eivät suuresti vaihtelisi. Nykyisellä hinnoittelumallilla kuitenkin verkkoyhtiöiden tulot jäävät hyvin riippuvaisiksi talven kylmyydestä. Nykyisin Suomessa yleisesti käytettävässä siirtohinnoittelun hinnoittelumallissa ei huomioida myöskään sitä, että verkkoyhtiön kustannukset ovat enemmän riippuvaisia verkossa siirretyistä tehoista kuin energioista. Siirtohinnoittelun kannalta on tapahtunut ja on tapahtumassa merkittäviä muutoksia. Etäluettavien sähkönkulutusmittarien käyttöönoton myötä asiakkaiden kulutuksesta saadaan huomattavasti entistä enemmän tietoa, mikä auttaa kustannusvastaavien hintojen määrittämisessä. Samaan aikaan asiakkaiden sähkön käyttö voi muuttua huomattavasti varsinkin sähköautojen ja lämpöpumppujen yleistymisen myötä. Tämän työn tarkoituksena on luoda Mäntsälän Sähkö Oy:lle sähkönsiirtohinnoittelun kustannuksia vastaavien hintojen määrittämiseksi laskentasovellus sekä selvittää tulevaisuuden siirtohinnoittelun toteuttamismahdollisuuksia. Lyhyen aikavälin suunnittelussa keskitytään kustannusvastaavien hintojen määrittämiseen keskihintaperiaatteen avulla ja pidemmän aikavälin suunnittelussa asiakkaiden huipputehoihin perustuvan hinnoittelun toteuttamisen vaikutuksiin sekä verkkoyhtiön että asiakkaan näkökulmasta.

Performance of laying hens and economic viability of different climatization systems

Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP)

EDP InovCity: Electricity feedback with smart meters through tv

A Work Project, presented as part of the requirements for the Award of a Masters Degree in Management from the NOVA – School of Business and Economics

EDP inovcity: Electricity feedback with smart meters through TV

In this work project I propose an innovative service – Electricity Feedback with Smart Meters through TV – to be considered as an additional test in the residential electricity use feedback trials currently being conducted in EDP’s InovCity project. My proposal is based on relevant past and current research studies, both Portuguese and international, which explain and support the proposed operationalization and characteristics of this new service. Furthermore, a careful analysis about the segmentation framing, the best market entry strategy and the consequences of adopting a joint venture with cable TV operators, is also provided. Finally, I present a SWOT analysis and highlight critical issues affecting the effectiveness of feedback which require further research.

Mathematical solutions for electricity networks in a low carbon future

Smart meters are becoming more ubiquitous as governments aim to reduce the risks to the energy supply as the world moves toward a low carbon economy. The data they provide could create a wealth of information to better understand customer behaviour. However at the household, and even the low voltage (LV) substation level, energy demand is extremely volatile, irregular and noisy compared to the demand at the high voltage (HV) substation level. Novel analytical methods will be required in order to optimise the use of household level data. In this paper we briefly outline some mathematical techniques which will play a key role in better understanding the customer's behaviour and create solutions for supporting the network at the LV substation level.

Cyclopedia of applied electricity; a general reference work on direct-current generators and motors, storage batteries, electrochemistry, welding, electric wiring, meters, electric light transmission, alternating-current machinery, telegraphy, etc.,

"A compilation of many of the most valuable instruction books of the American school of correspondence."--Forword.

Customer information system data pre-processing with feature selection techniques for non-technical losses prediction in an electricity market

Non-technical losses (NTL) identification and prediction are important tasks for many utilities. Data from customer information system (CIS) can be used for NTL analysis. However, in order to accurately and efficiently perform NTL analysis, the original data from CIS need to be pre-processed before any detailed NTL analysis can be carried out. In this paper, we propose a feature selection based method for CIS data pre-processing in order to extract the most relevant information for further analysis such as clustering and classifications. By removing irrelevant and redundant features, feature selection is an essential step in data mining process in finding optimal subset of features to improve the quality of result by giving faster time processing, higher accuracy and simpler results with fewer features. Detailed feature selection analysis is presented in the paper. Both time-domain and load shape data are compared based on the accuracy, consistency and statistical dependencies between features.

Time-of-use electricity tariffs with smart meters

This paper proposes a method for scheduling tariff time periods for electricity consumers. Europe will see a broader use of modern smart meters for electricity at residential consumers which must be used for enabling demand response. A heuristic-based method for tariff time period scheduling and pricing is proposed which considers different consumer groups with parameters studied a priori, taking advantage of demand response potential for each group and the fairness of electricity pricing for all consumers. This tool was applied to the case of Portugal, considering the actual network and generation costs, specific consumption profiles and overall electricity low voltage demand diagram. The proposed method achieves valid results. Its use will provide justification for the setting of tariff time periods by energy regulators, network operators and suppliers. It is also useful to estimate the consumer and electric sector benefits from changes in tariff time periods.

Multi-agent Simulation of Bilateral Contracting in Competitive Electricity Markets

Traditional vertically integrated power utilities around the world have evolved from monopoly structures to open markets that promote competition among suppliers and provide consumers with a choice of services. Market forces drive the price of electricity and reduce the net cost through increased competition. Electricity can be traded in both organized markets or using forward bilateral contracts. This article focuses on bilateral contracts and describes some important features of an agent-based system for bilateral trading in competitive markets. Special attention is devoted to the negotiation process, demand response in bilateral contracting, and risk management. The article also presents a case study on forward bilateral contracting: a retailer agent and a customer agent negotiate a 24h-rate tariff. © 2014 IEEE.

Multi-agent simulation of bilateral contracting in competitive electricity markets

Traditional vertically integrated power utilities around the world have evolved from monopoly structures to open markets that promote competition among suppliers and provide consumers with a choice of services. Market forces drive the price of electricity and reduce the net cost through increased competition. Electricity can be traded in both organized markets or using forward bilateral contracts. This article focuses on bilateral contracts and describes some important features of an agent-based system for bilateral trading in competitive markets. Special attention is devoted to the negotiation process, demand response in bilateral contracting, and risk management. The article also presents a case study on forward bilateral contracting: a retailer agent and a customer agent negotiate a 24h-rate tariff. © 2014 IEEE.

Consumer energy management system with integration of smart meters

This paper develops an energy management system with integration of smart meters for electricity consumers in a smart grid context. The integration of two types of smart meters (SM) are developed: (i) consumer owned SM and (ii) distributor owned SM. The consumer owned SM runs over a wireless platform - ZigBee protocol and the distributor owned SM uses the wired environment - ModBus protocol. The SM are connected to a SCADA system (Supervisory Control And Data Acquisition) that supervises a network of Programmable Logic Controllers (PLC). The SCADA system/PLC network integrates different types of information coming from several technologies present in modern buildings. The developed control strategy implements a hierarchical cascade controller where inner loops are performed by local PLCs, and the outer loop is managed by a centralized SCADA system, which interacts with the entire local PLC network. In order to implement advanced controllers, a communication channel was developed to allow the communication between the SCADA system and the MATLAB software. (C) 2014 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).

Determining the Adjustment Baseline Parameters to Define an Accurate Customer Baseline Load

Demand response is an energy resource that has gained increasing importance in the context of competitive electricity markets and of smart grids. New business models and methods designed to integrate demand response in electricity markets and of smart grids have been published, reporting the need of additional work in this field. In order to adequately remunerate the participation of the consumers in demand response programs, improved consumers’ performance evaluation methods are needed. The methodology proposed in the present paper determines the characterization of the baseline approach that better fits the consumer historic consumption, in order to determine the expected consumption in absent of participation in a demand response event and then determine the actual consumption reduction. The defined baseline can then be used to better determine the remuneration of the consumer. The paper includes a case study with real data to illustrate the application of the proposed methodology.