Agile Networking in Smart Grids

Recently, the smart grid (SG) has been introduced to solve the serious network issues caused by the increasing electrical demand and the complex nonlinear nature of the electric power distribution network. The SG, regarded as the next generation power grid, can transmit power in more efficient ways by building an automatic and distributed energy delivery network. In this paper, we first assess how various existing networking technologies, such as IEEE 802.11 (WiFi) and IEEE 802.15.4 (ZigBee), meet the requirements of the SG communication protocols. Specifically, we classify the existing network protocols into three categories: WSN-based networking, WiFi-based networking, and wireline-based networking. We then survey the security issues regarding the SG. Finally, we propose an agile SG networking architecture and show the effectiveness of different adopted networking technologies and, as a result, present a candidate solution to implement agile networking in SGs.