Bi-directional energy meters and remote monitoring of energy nodes using LonWorks technology

This paper discusses the implementation of bi-directional smart energy meter based on the LonWorks technology. A smart meter is an electrical device that records consumption of electrical energy and various other electrical parameters and enables the measurement of energy in both directions (export and import). This digital energy meter has the Neuron Processor as the central controlling unit. This neuron chip is interfaced with energy metering chip and this is termed as the energy node. Signal conditioning network is used to scale down the voltages and currents for the energy metering chip. The neuron chip is programmed to calculate the energy parameters by appropriate scaling operation on the values obtained from the registers of the energy metering chip. The programming is such that both import and export energy can be tracked. This energy node is interfaced with the iLON Smart Server which allows us to link many devices to it. The smartness of the system lies in its bi-directional energy measurement capability, interoperability, compactly sizes energy nodes with aesthetic display and ability to be interfaced with a web server making it web based monitoring system which can be used for remote management applications.