IJSTE - International Journal of Science Technology & Engineering | Volume 2 | Issue 11 | May 2016

ISSN (online): 2349-784X

Design Low Cost Smart Card Based Prepaid

Energy Meter
Mr. Ketan K. Lad
Assistant Professor
Department of Electrical Engineering
GIDC Degree Engineering College, Navsari, Gujarat

Abstract
Now a days, electricity billing system are inaccurate, costly and slow because it depends on human which prepare electricity bill.
To overcome this problem smart card based prepaid energy meter is designed. Using prepaid smart card energy meter, we can
reduce human error while taking meter reading because there is no need to take reading in it. Microcontroller is used in this Energy
meter .So, design cost is low. Energy meter is recharged using RFID smart card and energy unit is recharged in meter. According
to the power consumption, the energy unit will be reduced. Recharge units and consumed units are displayed on to LCD display.
When it reaches to zero, main supply is automatically off using relay.
Keywords: Micro-controller, LCD, relay, voltage and current controlling unit, smart card, RFID, ZCD
________________________________________________________________________________________________________
I.

INTRODUCTION

In todays world, utilization of energy is necessary. For proper utilization, we have to observe how much energy we consume
daily. It is possible to measure the consumed energy by simple energy meter. But there is some problem in the energy measuring
system. Prepaid energy meter is the alternative of this current system. By using prepaid energy meter, we can easily observe how
much energy we consume and utilize the energy consumption. Microcontroller ATMEGA32 and RFID reader are the main part of
this implementation.
Proposed Prepaid Energy Meter:
Block diagram of proposed low cost smart card prepaid energy meter is shown in Fig. 1

Fig. 1: Proposed prepaid energy meter

The above diagram shows the block diagram of the prepaid energy metering system. In this first the voltage and current
controlling unit senses the voltage and current from supply mains and also the power factor is calculated according to the voltage
and current phase angle. Then these values are given to the micro-controller. According to the load the energy is calculated which
is displayed on LCD. The RFID card is used as smart card in which number of units is recharged. According to the energy consumed
the charged unit is decreased and, when the recharged unit is zero, the relay trip and the power supply cut off.
Voltage and Current Sensing Unit:
Voltage Sensor Unit:
The voltage sensor steps down the supply voltage and add the DC offset to the waveform because microcontroller read the voltage
from 0 to 5v. The voltage sensor is a differential amplifier which consists of resistors, capacitors and op-amp. Resistors R1 to R8

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and op-amp step down the supply voltage and add 5v offset value to shift waveform in positive side (see (1) and (2)). Then voltage
divider, divide the output of op-amp to limit it up to 5v.
Vout= gain * Vin
(1)
Gain=R8/(R4+R5+R6)
(2)

Fig. 2: Voltage sensor unit

Current Sensor Unit:

A current sensor is a device that detects electrical current in a wire, and generates a voltage signal proportional to it. In this project
we used the Hall Effect sensor (ACS712-30A) as a current sensor. This sensor generate voltage of 0.066 v for 1 A.

Fig. 3: Current sensor unit

Power Factor Measurement:
Power factor measuremnt is necessary to find actual energy consuned by the load. So, zero cross detection (ZCD) method is used
to find phase diffence between voltage current. In ZCD, op-amp generates square wave signals as waveform crossing the zero line
and this squarewave is applied to optocoupler which clip the negative part of squarewave and limit the signal from 0 to 5v. Here,
two ZCD are used. Output of both ZCD are applied to X-OR gate which generate pulses and these pulses are applied to the microcontroller which can follow this rising or falling edges and with its ability related timer/counter calculates the time period of this
pulses.eq.3 and eq.4 shows how to calculate phase angle from time period calculate by microcontroller
T=X * (microcontroller timer clock period)
(3)
here, T=time period of pulse X=counter value of timer
Phase angle= f *360 * T
(4)
Here, f=frequency(50 Hz)
RFID Card Reader:
EM-18 RFID READER is one of the commonly used RFID reader to read 125KHz tags. It features low cost, low power
consumption, small form factor and easy to use. It provides both UART AND wiegand 26 output formats. It can be directly
interfaced with microcontrollers using UART and with pc using an RS232 converter.

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II. CALCULATION
Voltage Calculation:
As discussed earlier, we step down the voltage using resistors and add offset voltage using op-amp. Here we take peak value of
voltage supply. If supply voltage is 220(it is a RMS value), so peak value is 310 volt.
Here, Vin=310 volt
V = Vin * Gain
Gain= R8/(R4+R5+R6)
= 22K/ (1000K+1000K+2.2K)
= 0.011
So, V=310*0.011 =3.41
After that we add offset of +5V to make all value positive. So, after adding offset, V=3.41+5 =8.41V. But microcontroller read
value between 0 to 5 V. so, we used voltage divider. So, output of voltage sensor unit is V/2=8.41/2 =4.2V . This voltage is given
to the microcontroller pin 40(ADC0) and in programming follow the reverse process and we get 310 volt and then take RMS value.
Current Calculation:
As mentioned earlier, if 1A is flowing in module ACS712 will generate 2.5+0.066=2.566volt.
This voltage is given to the microcontroller pin 39(ADC1).
Power Factor Measurement:
Power angle (COS) = 360*f*T
Where; f=frequency, T=time difference
If delay between voltage and current is 0.53msec then, COS=360*50*0.53 =0.97
Energy Calculation:
Power= Voltage * current *COS
(5)
Here, we want to calculate the energy unit consumed by the load and 1unit=1KWH
ENERGY UNIT=P/1000*3600

(6)

III. HARDWARE OF LOW COST PREPAID ENERGY METER

Fig. 5: Hardware of low cost smart card based prepaid energy meter

IV. TESTING RESULTS

We compare conventional energy meter and proposed prepaid energy meter. We have taken the reading for 0.1 unit
consumption with different loads as described in Table 1. From that comparison, we can see that this proposed prepaid
energy meter will work with low error when using on low load.
SR
NO.
1
2
3

UNIT
0.1
0.1
0.1

LOAD
watt)
300
600
800

Table 1
Comparison of unit consumption in conventional and prepaid energy meter
(in
TIME(in sec) (CONEVTIONAL
TIME(in sec) (PREPAID
ENERGY METER)
ENERGY METER)
1481
1486
688
697
65
66

PERCETAGE
ERROR
0.33
1.3
1.5

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V. FEATURES
Feature from Supplier Point of View:

No bill production
No bill distribution
Keep customers on supply
No need to chase payments
No further actions such as disconnections
Customer responsible for disconnection
Load and demand side management

Feature from Customer Point of View:

Pay to suit your income status

Daily, weekly , monthly budgeting
Show true cost of consumption and money left
No billing errors
VI. CONCLUSION

Proposed energy meter calculate the consumed energy and energy unit. We can recharge this meter through RFID card. If recharge
unit is zero then relay is off and main power supply is cut off. With low load this prepaid energy meter will work with low error.
REFERENCES
[1]
[2]
[3]
[4]
[5]
[6]

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Sudarshan k. valluru, Design and assemble of low cost prepaid smart card energy Meter, IJEEI, Vol.6, No.1, March 2014, pp 65-73.
S.Sukumar, P. Mukesh Arvind, L.Manivannan, P. Naveen Kumar, N.Suthanthira Vanitha, GSM based automatic trip system for energy management,
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Md. Mejbaul Haque, Md. Kamal Hossain, Md. Mortuza Ali, Md. Rafiqul Islam Sheikh, Microcontroller based single phase digital prepaid energy
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