METERING

Smarter Metering - Now & in Future

Texas Instruments offers Smarter Metering solutions in India - For Now and
for the Future
SHAILESH THAKURDESAI, TEXAS INSTRUMENTS

rowth and Sustainability is the order

of the day. Energy is a prime mover
of economic growth and is vital for
the sustenance of a growing
economy like India. Given the
widening energy supply-demand gap, the current
scenario in India depicts a picture of concern.
India is one the largest energy consumers in the
world and the available power is insufficient for the
countrys needs. It has therefore become
imperative to accelerate the development of the
sector to meet the countrys growth aspirations.
Also given the growing environmental concerns,
the future economic growth of our country crucially
depends on the long-term availability of energy
from sources that are affordable, accessible and
environmentally friendly. One of the areas that is
increasingly gaining confidence as a solution to this
crisis is Smart Metering. A majority of energy
consuming appliances constitute of refrigerators,
electric ovens, water heaters, A/C equipments and
washing machines. These and electricity (or gas
and water) meters need to be networked for
communication, in order to achieve energy usage
efficiency. The opportunities for advanced metering
systems in the Indian market are exciting. We see
some key expectations from our customers that
include flexibility in design requirements, future
proof solutions (remote firmware
upgrades/technical enhancements with minimal
design changes both mechanical and electrical),
end-to-end smart grid experience, ultra-low-power
metrology MCUs and highest accuracy
measurements in metering system. Customers
demand global expertise coupled with innovation
which is critical to their smart grid designs. We, at
Texas Instruments (TI), have been working on these
issues and collaborate with our customers to solve
their problems. Across the application spectrum, TI
supports every stage of the design process, from
device selection and software development to tools
and system solutions. Texas Instruments (TI) has a
big initiative to produce green semiconductor

devices and technologies that utilize alternate

energy sources like solar, hydro and wind energy. TI
has been focusing heavily on its R&D for the Indian
and global market for a greener world. In order to
meet growing power demands in India, electricity
generation and distribution capacity will need to be
increased by large amounts as well as cutting down
the losses (improving efficiency at generation sites
& minimizing losses in the distribution sector).
Technology is bound to play a key role in the
development of smarter energy solutions in terms of
not only improving the efficiency and capabilities of
existing systems but is also fueling the development
of some very interesting technologies like smart
metering/ grids. With a broad portfolio of over
40,000 products, TI is in an ideal position to play a
major role in the market of innovative and green
technology. In recent times, this technology has
gained speed in terms of adoption levels. Many
governments worldwide have adopted smart grids
as a way of addressing energy independence,
global warming and emergency resilience issues
and the adoption level of this technology is
expected to increase in the near future.
In India, majority of installed meters are still electromechanical meters as opposed to digital ones
which started in the market about 5-6 years ago.
Some of the issues that are faced in electromechanical meters are accuracy (threshold issues
for low usage), poor theft detection and tampering,
expensive communications add-ons and with little
room for control. Digital meters although accurate
are bit expensive but over a period of time as every
other electronics piece the price is coming down
and should not be a gating factor. A smart meter is
an advanced electrical meter that records
consumption in intervals of an hour or less and
communicates that information, at least, daily
through a communications network back to the
utility for monitoring and billing purposes. Smart
meters enable two-way communication between
the meter and the central system or smart grid. This
technology enables the control of appliances in

METERING
helps to deal with issues like pilferage, manual data
collection and accuracy and enables remote
monitoring of the data which gets relayed to the
central station using a two-way communication
system. They also automatically switch-off certain
applications based on demand, leading to energy
savings. Given the need for very low power
consumption, microcontrollers like the MSP430
are ideal for any metering application. An
advanced electronic meter requires an MCU that
offers precise measurements over a wide dynamic
range, programmable Flash, non-volatile storage,
real-time clock function, flexible display and AMRenabled communications features. TIs MSP430
family offers up to seven 24-bit independent sigmadelta converters and programmable gain
amplifiers along with specific integrated e-metering

Smart Metering or "Smart Grid" opportunities

Outside the home
(Wide Area Network)
Inside the home
(Home Area Network)

Smart Grid:
Consumer participation
Distributed generation
Resilient, self-healing
Future proof PHEV,
broadband...
Metering, "Smart Grid" includes electrical, water gas meters
and adjacent segments in the home-thermostate,
smart appliances, in-home display, demand response unit,
charging electrical vehicles (EVSE)

Fig.1.

both home area network as well as wide area

network to save energy, reduce cost and increase
reliability and transparency (Figure 1). In energy,
water and gas utility meters, smart meter adoption
N L
BR1
PWM
AC/DC

Metrology

System
Power

109804
I

SENSE
Embedded
Signal
Processor

MSP430
E-Meter SoC
MCU, RTC,LCD

SENSE

Home Area Network (HAN)

Wireless Communication

Application
Processor
Application Processor
Stellaris Cortex M3/
MSP430

CC25xx
Bo2,15,4SoC
Radio, MCU

Antenna

RF Front
END

Wide Area Network

Power Line Communication Modern (PLC)
Wireless Communication
(868/900MHz ISM)
TX

RX

PWM

TMS320F26xx
Flexible, 32-Bit,
PLC Controller

CC11xx/CC430
ISM-Band SoC
Radio, MCU

ADC

Interface Options

Wired
Interface
(RS485)

Enfora
GSM/GPRS
Module

Pre-Payment
RFID
(Wireless)

Antenna
Matching
Circuit

METERING

SD16
v

MSP430F47197
E-Meter SoC
RTC, LCD

Based on 3-phase
Metering EVM
CC430 or CC11xx
ISM-band SoC
Radio + MCU or
Transceiver

CC42530
802.15.44- ZigBee SoC
Radio + MCU

1.8V 3.3V

TPS70251
Dual LDO

OPA564
PWM

TMS320F28xx
Flexible PLC Modem
32-bit MCU
ADC

N L

TL3842
Isolated
AC/DC

PGA112

modules such as the ESP engine or 32x32

hardware multiplier allowing for easy, high
performance metering calculations
The increased adoption of this technology has
opened up numerous opportunities for
semiconductor manufacturers. Semiconductors
play an essential role in determining the power
reliability, efficiency and resiliency of the smart grid/
meters. TI offers smarter grid solutions with a broad
portfolio of systems products, software and tools for
grid infrastructure, utility metering, power line
communications (PLC), and home or building
automation development. TI has a variety of
products that cater to metering applications. Some
of the important product lines for metering
applications include microcontrollers (16-bit
MSP430, 32-bit ARM Cortex, 32-bit real time
C2000) and analog (low-power RF, data
converters & amplifiers and power management
chips). Most of these products come with ultra lowpower capabilities, higher efficiency &
performance levels, higher accuracy with lower
error margins and greater degree of integration
across interfaces. TI's Stellaris Cortex M3 MCUs
can also integrate additional functionalities in
smart meters like load demand response, Tariff
management, communication stacks and others.
TIs F28x controller platform provides a costeffective means to implement PLC technology in
smart meters. With TI's WiLink 6.0 solution, Smart
Meter customers can connect to a wide range of
products such as home wireless routers and
residential gateways, enabling the Smart Meter to
easily connect to the network.
As utilities
requirements grow, pushing more and more smart
functions like load demand response, Tariff
management, communication and others, as

metrology firmware may require to be qualified and

isolated from the rest of the functions, the
application layer for the smart electricity meter may
require an additional functional unit to the primary
Metrology function commonly called a Main MCU
or the Application Processor. This MCU will typically
require large amount of on-chip flash and
connectivity. This can be the MSP430 with devices
going up to 256kB flash, allowing leveraging
development effort made on the Metrology side.
Time to market pushing to software re-uses and
easy migration, standard cores are very often
required. With over 140 members in its family
available today, TI's Stellaris Cortex M3 offers the
widest selection of precisely-compatible MCUs in
the industry. With many connectivity options,
including the unique EMAC + PHY integrated in
one device, many serial port combinations
available to accommodate communication
options, various flash size offer, TI's Stellaris Cortex
M3 enables enabling powerful, cost-effective and
simple to program paths for growing application
layers for smart electricity meters. To conclude, the
increasing energy supply demand gap would
prove to be a deterrent for a growing economy as
ours. Given this supply demand gap plus the
environmental concerns, smarter energy
technologies like smart metering/ grid solutions will
assume greater importance in the future. Although
the adoption level for this technology has increased
in recent times, not many people are aware of its
benefits. Under these circumstances, it has become
imperative to not only spread awareness on the
importance of energy conservation and issues like
global warming but also on such green power
solutions and encourage people to adopt them.
For comments/feedback/questions, please write
back to us at ticontrib-in@ti.com. We look forward
to hearing from you.

About Author
Shailesh Thakurdesai,
Business Development Manager,
Microcontrollers,
Texas Instruments India