ABSTRACT

In this article you will get an overview of research, applications, and the regulatory activities on power
line communications. Transmission issues on the power line are investigated and their modeling
approaches are illustrated. Communication techniques and reliability issues are treated. Power lines
constitute a rather hostile medium for data transmission. Varying impedance, considerable noise, and
high attenuation are the main issues. The power line communication (PLC) is a new technology open to
improvements in some key aspects. Some companies in the world provide broad band PLC devices and
an increasing number of utility companies have already gone through field trials and commercial
deployment of PLC services. Power-line communications over the low-voltage networks is gaining the
attention of researchers in both broadband and narrowband application areas. The transmission
characteristics of the power- line carrier are very significant in signal propagation.

The power line modem uses the power line cable as communication medium. It is convenient as it
eliminates the need to lay additional cables. The modem at the transmission end modulates the signal
from data terminal through RS-232 interface onto the carrier signal in the power line. At the receiving
end, the modem recovers the data from the power line carrier signal by demodulation and sends the data
to data terminals through RS-232 interface.

INTRODUCTION
Power line communication or power line carrier (PLC), also known as Power line Digital Subscriber
Line (PDSL), mains communication, power line telecom (PLT), power line networking (PLN), or
Broadband over Power Lines (BPL) are systems for carrying data on a conductor also used for electric
power transmission. Electrical power is transmitted over high voltage transmission lines, distributed
over medium voltage, and used inside buildings at lower voltages. Power line communications can be
applied at each stage. Most PLC technologies limit themselves to one set of wires (for example,
premises wiring), but some can cross between two levels (for example, both the distribution network and
premises wiring). Typically the transformer prevents propagating the signal which allows multiple PLC
technologies to be bridged to form very large networks. Generally power networks can be classified into
three broad categories: dc current supply used in industrial applications such as automotive; sinusoidal
supply used for electrical distribution networks or domestic applications; and pulse width-modulated
(PWM) networks used in the vast majority of applications involving converters and actuators. Power-
line communication (PLC) technology is widely used over sinusoidal and continuous electrical networks
and data rates up to several hundred megabits per second are guaranteed.

Those PLC modems cannot operate on PWM networks who present, by nature, a broad spectral
occupancy. Thus, this seminar proposes an overview of the PLC technology and its operating limits over
a PWM network. Based on a detailed study of the inverter spectrum, new PLC modems dedicated for
the PWM network are developed. The capacity of these modems in terms of transmission reliability and
data rate is evaluated. This technology avoids using any additional cables between the actuator and the
converter which can be advantageous in terms of price and overall dimension.

Fig 1

Communication over power line has a

history of about hundred years
old [1]. In early days communication
was started using very low
frequencies. Today, due to increasing
demand of networking in home,
offices, buildings, industrial
organizations etc, the power lines are
considered as a medium for high
speed data(>2Mbps)
transmission[2,3].
Communication over powerline has a
history of about hundred years
old [1]. In early days communication
was started using very low
frequencies. Today, due to increasing
demand of networking in home,
offices, buildings, industrial
organizations etc, the power lines are
considered as a medium for high
speed data(>2Mbps)
transmission[2,3].
PLC Market: Overview

Segments

For the purpose of understanding, PLC can be broadly viewed as:

1. Narrowband PLC

2. Broadband PLC

Narrowband PLC works at lower frequencies (3-500 kHz), lower data rates (up to 100s of kbps), and
has longer range (up to several kilometers), which can be extended using repeaters. Broadband PLC
works at higher frequencies (1.8-250 MHz), high data rates (up to 100s of Mbps) and is used in shorter-
range applications.

Recently, narrowband Power Line Communication has been receiving widespread attention due to its
applications in the Smart Grid. Another application that narrowband PLC has been used in is smart
energy generation, particularly in micro-inverters for solar panels.

Broadband PLC, in contrast, has mainly found acceptance as a last-mile solution for Internet
distribution and home networking. With its high data rates and no additional wiring, broadband PLC is
seen as an exciting and effective technology for multimedia distribution within homes. This optimism in
the market is reflected by the recent acquisitions of Intellon by Atheros, Coppergate by Sigma, DS2 by
Marvell, and Gigle by Broadcom, all in the Home Area Networking (HAN) segment.

There is another way to classify Power Line Communication and that is:

1. PLC over AC lines

2. PLC over DC lines

PLC:
The PLC is nothing but the communication media in between the transmitter and the receiver which is
known as power line channel or powerline carrier modem.Data rates over a power line communication
system vary widely. Low-frequency (about 100-200 KHz) carriers impressed on high-voltage
transmission lines may carry one or two analog voice circuits, or telemetry and control circuits with an
equivalent data rate of a few hundred bits per second; however, these circuits may be many miles long.
Higher data rates generally imply shorter ranges; a local area network operating at millions of bits per
second may only cover one floor of an office building, but eliminates installation of dedicated network
cabling.

Data rates over a power line communication system vary widely. Low-frequency (about 100-200 KHz)
carriers impressed on high-voltage transmission lines may carry one or two analog voice circuits, or
telemetry and control circuits with an equivalent data rate of a few hundred bits per second; however,
these circuits may be many miles long. Higher data rates generally imply shorter ranges; a local area
network operating at millions of bits per second may only cover one floor of an office building, but
eliminates installation of dedicated network cabling.

Modulation Schemes
A variety of modulation schemes can be used in PLC. Some of these are Orthogonal Frequency Division
Multiplexing (OFDM), Binary Phase Shift Keying (BPSK), Frequency Shift Keying (FSK), Spread-FSK
(S-FSK) and proprietary schemes too (for example Differential Code Shift Keying (DCSK) from
Yitran). In the table below, BPSK, FSK, SFSK and OFDM are compared on the basis of two important
criteria – bandwidth efficiency and complexity (cost).

Table 1 Comparison of Modulation schemes

Modulation Bandwidth Complexity

 Scheme Efficiency
BPSK Medium Low
FSK Medium Low
SFSK Low Medium
OFDM High High

OFDM in particular offers high data rates, but requires computational horsepower to churn out Fast
Fourier Transforms (FFT) and Inverse-FFT (IFFT), as required by the scheme. On the other hand,
BPSK, FSK are robust and simple but offer lower data rates. The current trend is to move towards
OFDM with PSK modulation (G3 and probably P1901.2). Such heavy computation will require DSP
capability, whereas FSK, PSK and SFSK can be accomplished by a microcontroller

DATA MODULATION TECHNOLOGIES:

Today the use of high speed application such as internet, voice and data has been increased that’s why
many researches has been done in last few years to investigate the properties of powerline channel at the
frequencies up to 20 or 30 MHz so that the powerline channel can be fixed as a communication system.
Orthogonal frequency division multiplexing and Spread spectrum Modulation are the two modulation
schemes mainly used with broadband powerline communication. Various broadband power line
communication (PLC) solutions based on OFDM technology are currently exists [4]. CDMA (Code
Division Multiple Access) modulation is a type of spread spectrum modulation used in some PLC
solutions because its successful application of CDMA in various communication areas suggests that it is
a good candidate in broadband powerline communications as well.

The powerline channel suffers from multipath fading and frequency selectivity along with manmade
impulsive bursty noise. This limits the performance of the channel for very high data rates. Performance
enhancement technique such as coding can help a multicarrier system to tackle with impulsive noise
burst. Further researches should be carried out in the field of efficient coding, modulation and
transmission methodologies, in order to ensure reliable communication over power lines. Space– time
coding is a new coding modulation technique for multiple antenna wireless systems [9].space– time
coding combine temporal and spatial diversity in order to provide less attenuated replicas of the
transmitted signals to the receivers and thus mitigate the destructive effects of attenuation. Two types of
modulation BPSK, PAM implemented with PLC [10].Block codes, cyclic codes convolutional codes etc,
are easily being used with powerline communication. These different multiplexing techniques OFDM,
CDMA, DS– CDMA, and MC– CDMA have been described by simulation in [11]. These techniques are
proved to be applicable for powerline communication, while transfer characteristics of powerline is just
as frequency selective and has deep fadings as the radio channel does. The main difference is the big
impulsive noises which are present in the powerline medium only and which seem to be overcome by
these techniques. When describing the various existing solutions it can be seen that the solutions which
use spread spectrum modulation tend to be narrow bandwidth applications, whereas only those solutions
using OFDM to date have been seen to increase in bandwidth and multicarrier techniques are being
promising modulation scheme for powerline communication.

Frequencies:
Different regions of the world have different frequency bands allocated to narrowband PLC. The table
below summarizes the different frequencies available for narrowband PLC communication in the
respective region.

Table 2 Narrow PLC frequency ranges for various regions

Region Redulatory Frequency Band Note

Body
Europe CENELEC 3-95Khz A-Energy Providers
95-125Khz B-Reserved for Users
125-140Khz C-Reserved for users , regulated CSMA access
140-148.5Khz D-Reserve for Users
Japan ARIB 10-450Khz
China EPRI 3-90Khz Not Regulated
3-500Khz
USA FCC 10-490Khz

CENELEC - European Committee for Electrotechnical Standardization.

ARIB – Association of Radio Industries & Businesses
EPRI – Electric Power Research Institute
FCC – Federal Communications Commission
HIGH-FREQUENCY COMMUNICATION:
High frequency communication may (re)use large portions of the radio spectrum for communication, or
may use select (narrow) band(s), depending on the technology. HF-DTPLC modem modulates base
band data with Differential Binary Phase Shift Keying (DBPSK) or Differential Quadrate Phase Shift
Keying (DQPSK), and transmits the modulated data on maximum of 5 tones. HF-DTPLC changes its
data transfer rate (DTR) from 40kbps to 400kbps automatically selecting appropriate modulation and
tones for data transmission under diverse and changeable power line conditions. [6]. Two frequency
bands are allocated to PLC; for low bit rate powerline communication 3 to 148 kHz and for high bit rate
2 to 20 MHz [1].

HOME NETWORKING:
Power line communications can also be used in a home to interconnect home computers (and networked
peripherals), as well as any home entertainment devices (including TVs, Blu-ray players, game consoles
and Internet video boxes such as Apple TV, Roku, Kodak Theatre, etc.) that have an Ethernet port.
Consumers can buy powerline adapter sets at most electronics retailers and use those to establish a wired
connection using the existing electrical wiring in the home. The powerline adapters plug into a wall
outlet (or into an extension cord or power strip, but not into any unit with surge suppression and
filtering, as this may defeat the signal) and then are connected via CAT5 to the home’s router. Then, a
second (or third, fourth, fifth) adapter(s) can be plugged in at any other outlet to give instant networking
and Internet access to an Ethernet-equipped Blu-ray player, a game console (PS3, Xbox 360, etc.) a
laptop or an Internet TV (also called OTT for Over-the-Top video) box that can access and stream video
content to the TV.

The most established and widely deployed power line networking standard for these power line adapter
products is from the Home Plug Power line Alliance. Home Plug AV is the most current of the Home
Plug specifications (Home Plug 1.0, Home Plug AV and the new Home Plug Green PHY for smart grid
comprise the set of published specifications) and it has been adopted by the IEEE P1901 group as a
baseline technology for their standard, due to be published and ratified in September or October of 2010.
Home Plug estimates that over 45 million Home Plug devices have been deployed worldwide. Other
companies and organizations back different specifications for power line home networking and these
include the Universal Power line Association, the HD-PLC Alliance and the ITU-T’s G.hn
specification[7,8].

BROADBAND OVER POWERLINES

Broadband over power lines (BPL), also known as power- line Internet or power-band, is the use of PLC
technology to provide broadband Internet access through ordinary power lines. A computer (or any other
device) would need only to plug a BPL "modem" into any outlet in an equipped building to have high-
speed Internet access. International Broadband Electric Communications or IBEC and other companies
currently offer BPL service to several electric cooperatives.

MEDIUM FREQUENCY COMMUNICATION:

Power line communications technology can use the household electrical power wiring as a transmission
medium. This is a technique used in home automation for remote control of lighting and appliances
without installation of additional control wiring.

Typically home-control power line communication devices operate by modulating in a carrier wave of
between 20 and 200 kHz into the household wiring at the transmitter. The carrier is modulated by digital
signals. Each receiver in the system has an address and can be individually commanded by the signals
transmitted over the household wiring and decoded at the receiver. These devices may be either plugged
into regular power outlets, or permanently wired in place. Since the carrier signal may propagate to
nearby homes (or apartments) on the same distribution system, these control schemes have a "house
address" that designates the owner.

Since 1999, a new power-line communication technology "universal powerline bus" has been
developed, using pulse- position modulation (PPM). The physical layer method is a very different
scheme than the modulated/demodulated RF techniques used by X-10. The promoters claim advantages
in cost per node, and reliability.[7]

CHALLENGES:
PLC, of course has its challenges. Firstly, Power lines were not designed to carry data, and actually
behave as low pass filters. Modeling the PL channel is difficult – it is a very harsh and noisy
transmission medium, frequency-selective, time varying, and is impaired by colored background noise
and impulsive noise. Thus maintaining signal integrity over power lines requires robust signaling
techniques and hardware. Secondly, the structure of the grid differs across and within countries and the
same applies for indoor wiring practices. There is no universal standard either for PLC or the grid; steps
to ensure interoperability of devices need to be taken. Thirdly, questions are being raised today about the
digital security of personal information that is sent over the power lines because these can be tapped
into. Thus establishing privacy safeguards and equally important - convincing the public of these is
another large-level issue that is being addressed. Lastly, PLC faces competition from other means of
communication - both wired and wireless, and ultimately the choice of technology will be decided by a
mix of cost, complexity, and feasibility. Today, the major competing technologies to narrowband PLC
are Zigbee, Wi-Fi, GPRS and RS-232.

CONCLUSION:
Power line channel certainly is a cheap way to communicate, since it doesn’t require any additional
wiring. It can support the social needs for access to digital services from anywhere at any time. Finally,
the overall conclusion coming from this paper is that power line communication can become a easily
adopted alternate for communication system. The market of PLC devices will continue to grow in the
near future with the integration of PLC interfaces like Wi– Fi, Eathernet, cable T.V. and so on, to fulfil
the aim of both network engineers and telecommunication engineers. With the increased emphasis on
developing PLC technology and standards, we can be confident that in the future, Power Line
Communication will continue adding smartness to our lines.

References:
[1] Xavier Carcelle,”Power Line Communications in Practice” Artech House Telecommunications
Library pp. 2– 8.
[2] J. V. C. Carmona and E. G. Pelaes ―Analysis and Performance of Traffic of Voice and
Video in Network Indoor PLC‖ IEEE Latin America Transactions, Vol. 10, No. 1, Jan. 2012.
[3] Marc Anthony Mannah, Christophe Batard, Nicolas Ginot, and Mohamed Machmoum‖A PLC-Based
Method for Data Transmission Over a Pulse width-Modulated Network‖ IEEE Transactions On
Power Delivery, Vol. 26, No. 4, October 2011.
[4] Joaquín Granado, Antonio Torralba, and Jorge Chávez ―Using Broadband Power Line
Communications in Non-Conventional Applications‖ IEEE Transactions on Consumer Electronics,
Vol. 57, No. 3, August 2011.
[5] Khalil Salehian, Yiyan Wu, Fellow, IEEE, Sebastien Lafleche, Gilles Gagnon, and Charles Einolf,
Life Fellow, IEEE” Field Measurements of EM Radiation From In-House Power Line
Telecommunications (PLT) Devices” IEEE Transactions on Broadcasting, Vol. 57, No. 1, March
2011
[6] P. Tanguy, F. Nouvel, ―In-Vehicle PLC Simulator based on Channel Measurements‖,
Proceedings of the IEEE Conference Intelligent Transport system Telecommunication ITST 2010,
November 2010, Kyoto
[7] Ravi Kumar Jatoth1, G.Ravikishore2‖ Design and Development of Prepaid Energy Meter with Serial
Data Transmission‖ National Institute of Technology-Warangal1, Sarada institute of science and
technology, India2International J. of Recent Trends in Engineering and Technology, Vol. 3, No. 4,
May 2010.
[8] S. Barmada, M. Raugi, M. Tucchi, ―Powerline communication in a full electric vehicle‖,
Proceedings of IEEE International Symposium on Power Line Communications and Its Applications,
Rio de Janeiro , 28-31 March 2010, pp.331-336.
[9] IEEE P1901/D2.01, ―IEEE Draft Standard for Broadband over Power Line Networks:
Medium Access Control and Physical Layer Specifications,‖ Jan. 2010.
[10] M. Mohammadi, L. Lampe L and all, ― Measurement study and transmission for in-vehicle
power line communication‖, Proceedings of IEEE Power Line Communications and Its Applications
ISPLC 2009, Dresden, 29-March -1 April 2009, pp. 73–78
[11] P. Tanguy, F. Nouvel and P. Maziéro, ―Power Line Communication standards for in-vehicle
networks‖, Proceedings of the IEEE Conference Intelligent Transport system Telecommunication
ITST 2009, 978-1-4244- 5347-4/09, 20-22 October 2009, pp. 533 537.
[12] S. D’Alessandro, A. Tonello, and L. Lampe, ―Bit-loading algorithms for OFDM with adaptive
cyclic prefix length in plc channels‖, in Power Line Communications and Its Applications, ISPLC
2009, 2009, pp. 177– 181.
[13] Hitoshi Kubota, Kazumasa Suzuki, Isamu Kawakami, Mamoru Sakugawa, and Hiroyuki Kondo‖
High Frequency Band Dispersed-Tone Power Line Communication Modem for Networked
Appliances‖ IEEE Transactions on Consumer Electronics, Vol. 52, No. 1, FEBRUARY 2006.
[14] Niovi Pavlidou, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki A. 1. Han Vinck, University of Essen Javad
Yazdani and Bahram Honaty, University of Lancaster‖ Power Line Communications: State of the Art
and Future Trends‖ IEEE Communications Magazine April 2003.
[15] Urriza, J.I. García Nicolás, A. Sanz, A. Va ldovinos: ―A System on Chip for Power Line
Communications According to European Home Systems Specifications‖, in Proceedings of the 11th
Field Programmable Logic 2001, August2001.