Feasibility Study and Performance Analysis of NB-IoT communications for PEA Smart Grid Network

This research aims at studying the feasibility and performance analysis of NB-IoT as a last-mile network for Provincial Electricity Authority (PEA) smart grid implementation. In this study, data transmission models are simulated in order to analyze the performance in various wireless channels according to the NB-IoT specifications. BER and SER versus the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) are used to evaluate the reliability of the channel. The communication channel scenarios studied in this research are modeled to reflect the different types of the area according to terrains and the density of connected devices that can be categorized into four propagation models. Specifically, the Rayleigh fading channel with the adjustment of the variance of the channel's paths corresponding to the power-delay profiles in each different propagation model is studied. From the experimental results, it has been showing that the performance of NB-IoT for the use in a rural area with a moderate density of connected devices (which is the most type of area in PEA's responsibility) has the best performance result. On the other hand, the use of NB-IoT in a big city with a high density of connected devices results in the worst performance among all simulated scenarios. The performance and reliability can be further enhanced by using a hybrid communication, which may integrate a PLC or RF-mesh communication systems into a network.