Committed to connecting the world

Girls in ICT

Question 15

​Communications for Smart Grid

(Continuation of Question 15/15)

Motivation
There is a growing interest worldwide in providing support for the integration of new technologies and applications aimed at sustainably addressing energy independence and modernization of the aging power grid, e.g. utility scale renewable energy sources, distributed energy resources, Plug-in Electric Vehicles, and Demand-Side Management. For supporting the above technologies and applications, it is necessary to ensure the availability of a modern, flexible, and scalable communications network that will tie together the functions of “monitoring” and “control.” Information and communication technologies will allow utilities to remotely locate, isolate, and restore power outages more quickly, thus increasing the stability of the grid. Information and communication technologies will also facilitate the integration of time-varying renewable energy sources into the grid, enable a better and more dynamic control of the load, and will also empower consumers with tools for optimizing their energy consumption.

The support of these applications will require the development of new Recommendations and enhancements to existing Recommendations covering all aspects of narrowband and broadband communications and their management across the power grid from generation to load. These studies will include communications issues from the physical layer to the transport of higher layer protocols over heterogeneous networks, as well as the definition of a smart grid communication architecture and requirements. Given the interdisciplinary nature of smart grid applications, it is expected that a high degree of cooperation with other ITU Study Groups and Questions as well as other International Bodies like IEC will be required.

A global audience will be targeted to facilitate a unified approach to the support of Smart Grid communications. The telecom industry has a very important role in Smart Grid applications, for example broadband access can be used in Demand Side Management and cloud hosted energy service providers can reach the home also via existing broadband access technologies. Additionally, the consumer electronics industry will develop products on the basis of new energy efficiency standards and these products will also support Smart Grid applications, like Demand Response. The convergence of telecom, power, and consumer electronics industries for Smart Grid applications will drive a new eco-system of products. This convergence must happen under the auspices of international SDOs in co-operation with each other.
The following major Recommendations, in force at the time of approval of this Question, fall under its responsibility: G.995x, and G.990x.

Question
What enhancements are needed to the G.995x and G.990x series Recommendations:
What new Recommendations are needed:
Study items include, but are not limited to:
These studies will include any specific requirements:
Tasks
Tasks include, but are not limited to:
NOTE − An up-to-date status of work under this Question is contained in the SG15 Work Programme at: http://www.itu.int/ITU-T/workprog/wp_search.aspx?sg=15 

Relationships


Recommendations: 
Questions: 
Study Groups:
Standardisation bodies, forums and consortia: