Extremely fast polling method for determining the presence of individual electric meters on a power line
First Claim
1. A method for simultaneously polling a plurality of electrical meters located at premises to which electricity is supplied through an electrical distribution system to determine the status at a location within the system comprising:
- transmitting a query signal from a transmission site over a power line to poll each meter comprising a group of meters to which a query signal is sent;
all of the meters in the group simultaneously sending a reply signal back to the transmission site over the power line, each separate reply signal having a predetermined bit pattern of N bits in length with the bit pattern for each meter being a unique bit pattern that is non-interfering with all of the other bit patterns sent by all of the other meters; and
, receiving the reply signals and processing the bit patterns comprising each reply signal to determine the status at each location of a polled meter.
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Accused Products
Abstract
A “super-fast” polling method for electrical meters for outage detection. In response to a query, a large group of electric meters (M) all simultaneously transmit reply signals over an electrical distribution network using TWACS®. The signals are separated by an inbound detector (IB) at a receiving end of the network. This allows a very large number of meters to be polled in a very short period of time to determine whether or not an outage has occurred at the location of each meter. Each meter transmits a bit pattern, and bit patterns are designed so a group of meter units can transmit their patterns simultaneously over a power line (L) to the inbound detector. The presence or absence of a bit pattern in the received signal conveys the presence or absence of the associated meter in the system. The ability to transmit multiple bit patterns in parallel requires that they be orthogonal to each other. The Hadamard matrices are a class of matrices whose rows could be used as a set of bit patterns. In addition to super-fast polling for outage detection, the method of the invention can also be used to poll meters for the presence of an alarm condition, as well as for both outage detection and an alarm condition.
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Citations
26 Claims
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1. A method for simultaneously polling a plurality of electrical meters located at premises to which electricity is supplied through an electrical distribution system to determine the status at a location within the system comprising:
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transmitting a query signal from a transmission site over a power line to poll each meter comprising a group of meters to which a query signal is sent;
all of the meters in the group simultaneously sending a reply signal back to the transmission site over the power line, each separate reply signal having a predetermined bit pattern of N bits in length with the bit pattern for each meter being a unique bit pattern that is non-interfering with all of the other bit patterns sent by all of the other meters; and
,receiving the reply signals and processing the bit patterns comprising each reply signal to determine the status at each location of a polled meter. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12)
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13. In a TWACS system used to communicate over power lines of an electric distribution network, a method for simultaneously polling a plurality of electrical meters located at premises to which electricity is supplied through the system to determine if a power outage has occurred at a location within the system comprising:
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transmitting an outbound TWACS signal over a power line to poll each meter comprising a group of meters to which the outbound signal is sent;
all of the meters in the group simultaneously sending an inbound TWACS reply signal back to the transmission site over the power line, each separate inbound signal having a predetermined bit pattern of N bits in length with the bit pattern for each meter being a unique bit pattern that is non-interfering with all of the other bit patterns sent by all of the other meters; and
,receiving the inbound signals and processing the bit patterns comprising each inbound signal to determine if an outage has occurred at the location of any of the polled meters. - View Dependent Claims (14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20)
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21. A method for simultaneously polling a plurality of electrical meters located at premises to which electricity is supplied through an electrical distribution network, using TWACS, to determine if a power outage has occurred at a location within the system comprising:
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transmitting an outbound TWACS signal over a power line to poll each meter comprising a group of meters to which the outbound signal is sent;
all of the meters in the group simultaneously sending an inbound TWACS signal back to the transmission site over the power line, each separate inbound signal having a predetermined bit pattern of N bits in length with the bit pattern for each meter being a unique bit pattern that is non-interfering with all of the other bit patterns sent by all of the other meters, the bit patterns being orthogonal bit patterns derived from a matrix in which all the rows are orthogonal to each other; and
,receiving the inbound signals and processing the bit patterns comprising each inbound signal to determine if an outage has occurred at the location of any polled meter. - View Dependent Claims (22, 23, 24, 25, 26)
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Specification