DETECTION OF ILLEGAL ELECTRICITY USAGE VIA POWERLINE COMMUNICATIONS

By

PRASANTHI.TADIKONDA(096M1A0248)

INTRODUCTION
India with its vast population is moving towards development mainly in economical sector. In this economical development electricity plays a vital role. As India is democratic country people started illegal usage of electricity using their democracy in a different way.

TOTAL ELECTRICAL NETWORK

Losses occur at all levels, from generation ,through transmission and distribution, to the consumer and the meter. It is normally at the distribution level where the majority of avoidable losses occur. All electrical power distribution companies operate with some accepted degree of losses.

METHODS OF ILLEGAL USAGE

For electromechanical meters (i)using mechanical objects (ii)using fixed magnets

For digital meters

(i)using the external phase before meter terminals (ii)switching the energy cables at the meter connector box

FOR ELECTROMECHANICAL METERS

Using mechanical objects: mechanical objects are used to reduce the speed of revolution of the disk ,so energy recorded will show us less than consumed energy. Using a fixed magnet: fixed magnets is used to change the electromagnetic field of the coils as recorded energy is proportional to electromagnetic field.

FOR DIGITAL METERS

Using the external phase before meter terminals: here energy is not recorded.

Switching the energy cables at the meter connector box: here current does not passes through current coil of the meter.

AUTOMATIC METER READING SYSTEM:

CONVERTS ELECTROMECHANICAL MOVEMENTS INTO DIGITAL FORM

THREE MAIN COMPONENTS OF AMR SYSTEM ARE:

Meter interface module: with power supply, meter sensors, controlling electronics and a communication interface that allows data to be transmitted from this remote device to a central location. Communications systems: used for the transmission, or telemetry, of data and control send signals between the meter interface units and the central office.

AMR COMMUNICATION SETUP

POWER LINE COMMUNICATION

No need of extra cables for illegal detection which is very economical. Involves injecting a high frequency A.C carrier on to the power line. Every user connected to each other via modems with data originating from central station. Electrical power system vary from place to place depending up on the power sources and loads. Main Function : using AMR in PLC allows theft power data to be transmitted from the remote device to a central location.

DETECTION AND CONTROL SYSTEM

Proposed control system is for the detection of illegal electricity usage for low voltage A.C powers and can be repeated for every distribution network with AMR is much preferred. And if an AMR is included in the system it contains HOST PLC unit and a modem named as PLC1A ,PLC2A, PLCNA for a N number of subscribers for the single distribution network.

SCHEMATIC ILLUSTRATION OF DETECTION

SYSTEM OF ILLEGAL ELECTRICITY USAGE

The detector PLC and energy meter must be placed between distribution main lines and subscriber lines . The connection point is usually in the air or at underground so it is not suitable for any person to access and this detector is easy to control. Plc signaling has some standardization like CENELEC and the ranges for frequency band and signaling levels are specified as follows: 395khz for electricity suppliers and 95-148.5khz for consumer use

The energy consumed by the user are recorded by energy meter chip and send to host PLC unit The detector system has two recorded energy data in host PLC unit ,one from AMR-PLC and other from PLC-modem at connection points The both reading are finally compared and error is detected if there is a difference between the readings. The contractor is included at subscriber location to turnoff the energy automatically as in case of illegal usage.

SIMULATION

: USED FOR SINGLE SUBSCRIBER

Disk speed is counted and energy value is noted in PLC modem and a switch is connected before the modem of the subscriber If host PLC and subscriber readings are different error is detected based on load connection The data rate between the host and other PLC modems is 2400bits /sec. Data signaling between PLC modems has a protocol which includes a header , address ,energy value data , error connection bits and other serial communication bits such as parity and stop bits.

SYSTEM SIMULATION AND MODELING OF THE

DETECTION SYSTEM OF ILLEGAL ELECTRICITY USAGE FOR ELECTROMECHANICAL

KW-HR-M

The protocol may also be changed according to properties of the required system and national power grid and architecture. The recorded energy is received in digital form directly by using part of the meter and hence optical reflector system is not required.

OVERVIEW OF PROPOSED DETECTOR SYSTEM

The PLC modems are host and target modems for two way communications to and from the host stations and the remotely controlled targets and energy meters include metering chips and circuit elements The system software has two parts: (i)assembler program for micro program controller and (ii)operating software for management of overall system of the system.

FUNCTIONS OF AMR
Every user has two PLC modems; one is for AMR and the other is used to send the data from second energy meter chip to host PLC modem. An energy must be installed in the connection box between a home line and a main power line. The host PLC unit must be placed in the distribution transformer and the system software configuration of the addressing format of PLC signaling must be designed carefully .

APPLICATION EXAMPLE OF PLC

The figure below shows an example in an remote automatic meter reading system. It illustrates the schematic diagram of the connection between power line modem and the data terminals using power line cables. This can be used as a reference for an actual application. As following figure,PLC203 is 3-phase and PLC201 is single phase.

Operating software must be designed for the information of every subscriber in every sub power network: subscriber identification number, billing address, etc.. The system has two values of the energy consumption for every user, so if there is a difference between them, an error signal is generated for the illegal user The proposed equipment is the only one distributed in the power network.

All host units in each distribution transformer may be connected to only one main center station via phone lines , fiber optic cable or RF links The relation between frequency , length and bit error probability are show shown in above graph Research work has been taking place in the CPRI, Bangalore for the remote , metering and detection of power theft and will soon be helpful to electricity boards in india.

CONCLUSION The proposed detector system to determine illegal electricity usage via power line communications is examined in the laboratory conditions. Results proved that if AMR and detector system are used together illegal usage of electricity might be detected. Once this proposed detection systems are tried in real power lines, the distribution losses in India can be reduced effectively.