Edge computing for smart grid: An overview on architectures and solutions

Abstract

Internet of Things (IoT) has made small objects and things to be networked and interconnected, and even connected to the Internet in order to offer advanced control and monitoring services. Smart embedded devices along with intelligent decision-making ability will increase the efficiency of services in different domains including smart grid. Similar to other IoT domain, smart grid consist of a massive number of sensors and data sources which continuously collect high-resolution data. Managing the large volume of data has been identified as one of the major challenges in IoT. To address this issue, Edge Computing envisions to process the data at the edge of the IoT network close to the embedded devices where the data is collected. This chapter aims to investigate the edge computing solutions for the smart grid. An edge computing model for the smart grid information processing, with a focus on smart home, is presented in this chapter. The advantages of this model in terms of self-supporting and privacy are discussed. Moreover, we present a use-case for smart home automation where the operating mode of home appliances are determined dynamically to respect the limited power budget of home while maximizing the user’s satisfaction and utility.