Characterization and Field Measurements of NB-PLC for LV Network

This paper presents a procedure for field measurements which provides a generalized Narrowband Power Line Communications (NB-PLC) channel model for low voltage (LV) access network in order to deploy advanced metering infrastructure (AMI) within Lahore, Pakistan. The measurements of allocated sites were performed in the residential (urban and rural), industrial and commercial electricity consumers for the NB-PLC channel modeling of overhead transmission lines (TLs). On the basis of extensive field measurement results, the average attenuation profile and transfer functions are presented. The results obtained from field measurements are validated by comparing them with a proposed Simulink model. A close agreement in the measured and simulated transfer function (TF) results is observed. The proposed Simulink model is an effort to model the NB-PLC channels in an effective way, especially in South Asian countries. KCI Citation Count: 1