Coupling for Power Line Communications: A Survey

Luis Guilherme da Silva Costa, Antônio Carlos Moreirão de Queiroz, Bamidele Adebisi, Vinicius Lagrota Rodrigues da Costa, Moisés Vidal Ribeiro
2017 Journal of Communication and Information Systems  
The advent of power line communication (PLC) for smart grids, vehicular communications, internet of things and data network access has recently gained ample interest in industry and academia. Due to the characteristics of electric power grids and regulatory constraints, the effectiveness of coupling between the power line and PLC transceivers has become a very important issue. Coupling devices used to inject or extract data communication signals into or from power lines are very important
more » ... ents of a PLC system. There is, however, an obvious gap in the literature for a detailed review of existing PLC couplers. In this paper, we present a comprehensive review of couplers, which are required for narrowband and broadband PLC transceivers. Prevailing issues that protract the design of couplers and consequently subtended the inventions of different types of couplers are clearly described. We also provide a useful classification of PLC couplers based on the type of physical couplings, voltage levels, frequency bandwidth, propagation modes and a number of connections. This survey will guide researchers, as well as designers alike, into a quicker resourcing when studying coupling in narrowband and broadband PLC systems. Since 1982 he has been with the same institution, where he is now Titular Professor at the Department of Electronic Engineering and at the Electrical Engineering Program of the Coordenação dos Programas de Pós-graduação em Engenharia (COPPE). His main interests are in general circuit theory, filters and signal processing, computer-aided synthesis and analysis of circuits, energy harvesting using electrostatic generators, and the history of electricity. Adebisi Bamidele received his Master degree in advanced mobile communication engineering and Ph.D. in communication systems from Lancaster University, UK, in 2003 and 2009,respectively. Before that, he obtained a B.Sc. degree in Electrical Engineering from Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, Nigeria, in 1999. He was a senior research associate in the School of Computing and Communication, Lancaster University between 2005 and 2012. He joined Manchester Metropolitan University, Manchester in 2012 where he is currently a Reader (Associate Professor) in Electrical and Electronic Engineering. He has worked on several commercial and government projects focusing on various aspects of wire-line and wireless communications. He is particularly interested in Research and Development of communication technologies for electrical energy monitoring/ management, transport, water, critical infrastructures protection, home automation, IoTs and Cyber-Physical Systems. He has several publications and a patent in the research area of data communications over power line networks and smart grid. He is a member of IET and a senior member of IEEE. Vinicius L. R. da Costa was born in Juiz de Fora -MG, Brazil, in 1992. He received the B.Sc. degree (2015) in Electrical Engineering from the Federal University of Juiz de Fora (UFJF), Brazil. Currently, he is an M.Sc. student at the same institution. Since 2014 has been with Smarti9 Ltda, where he is hardware/firmware programmer. His main interests are in general PLC theory, filters and signal processing, development of firmware, and hardware programming.
doi:10.14209/jcis.2017.2 fatcat:fmxlw5ovofguxlzrbe4qodbqom