Università
della
Svizzera
italiana
Intelligent, low-power and low-cost measurement system for energy consumption
Additional information
Authors
Minosi A.,
Martinola A.,
Mankan S.,
Prevostini M.,
Kostadinov A. N.,
Balzarini F.
Type
Article in conference proceedings
Year
2003
Language
English
Abstract
In the area of utility measurement systems, there is increasing awareness to the importance of using intelligent and secure meter readers. The aim is not simply that of reducing operational costs; aspects such as availability of real-time determination of consumption (mainly in the case of energy meters, but potentially also for water consumption etc.) are relevant not only for actions such as real-time billing but also in view of an increasing environmental awareness leading to ''preferential'' billing in particular times of the day or of the week and requiring availability of fine-grained statistics. All these actions in turn involve the requirement of data integrity; when utilities other than power providers are considered, the device should be battery-powered (and very long battery life must be granted), so that low-power design becomes a further requirement while being permanently either in active or in standby mode; moreover, not being connected to the power network means that wireless connections for transmitting and receiving information must be taken into account. Finally, these devices should be made available to the general public and thus be low-cost ones. This paper describes how all the above constraints have been analyzed in the design of a wireless meter reading system.
Conference proceedings
VECIMS 2003
Month
July
Start page number
125
End page number
130
Meeting place
Lugano
Keywords
measurement systems, meter reading systems, power consumption
