2013 Australasian Telecommunication Networks and Applications Conference (ATNAC)
Performance Analysis of a City Smart Grid
Communication Network based on the IEEE 802.16e
Standard
Khalid I. Saad and Jamil Y. Khan
School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
University of Newcastle, Callaghan, NSW 2308, Australia
khalid.saad@uon.edu.au, jamil.khan@newcastle.edu.au
Abstract– A smart grid communication network will enable the
electricity operators to connect various intelligent devices, smart
meters and other sensors to different servers located within the
electricity grid. Automated meter reading is a key feature of a
smart grid which requires installation of a communication
network that can access 100% of smart meters within its
coverage area. Smart meter connectivity in inner cities is a
challenging problem due to the location of meters inside high rise
buildings as well as due to difficult propagation conditions. In
this paper we analyze the connectivity pattern of smart meters in
an inner city environment using an IEEE 802.16e based WiMAX
network. The paper initially models the inner city propagation
environment to study the connectivity pattern. Based on the
propagation model the work developed a transmission power
ramping algorithm to provide 100% meter connectivity.
Simulation models were developed based on OPNET and
MATLAB packages.
Keywords– IEEE 802.16e, WiMAX; propagation; urban area;
smart grid
I. INTRODUCTION
Design and deployment of smart grid communication
networks are vital for the success of the future smart grid. The
communication network within a smart grid allows exchange
of key information between different entities thus ensuring
smooth operation of the system. Smart grid communication
networks will be deployed in different geographical areas to
allow exchange of data and control information among various
entities within the coverage area of an electricity network. One
of the key problems in designing a smart grid communication
network in an inner city environment is the difficult
propagation environment due to location of the meters,
presence of many high rise buildings and other structures
which develop a complex propagation environment.
Particularly the smart meter reading process could be
significantly affected by the location of the meters. The smart
meter reading process will be carried by the NAN (Neighbor
Area Network) which could be designed based on a number of
wireless networking technologies such as 3G/4G based
cellular networking standards, wireless mesh networking
standards or wired local and wide area networking standards.
In this work we are concentrating on a WiMAX based cellular
networking standard to develop a NAN for smart meter
readings. This paper particularly focuses on the propagation
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modeling task which is very crucial for the design of a wide
area wireless network. In this paper we concentrate on design
of up and down links for a WiMAX network based on a
propagation study.
In the literature different propagation models have been
proposed for different deployment and terrain conditions. A
number of important propagation models that are currently
being used to study propagation conditions include the Hata
Model, the Cost 231 Walfisch Ikegami (WI) Model, the Erceg
Model and the ITU Path Loss Model [1]. The Cost 231 WI
model and the Erceg Model are recommended for the urban
area propagation modeling by the WiMAX Forum [1]. Among
these two models, the first one considers terrain parameters in
more detail than the Erceg model does. Radio signal
propagation in a dense urban area with lots of high rise
buildings and structures is generally affected by a number of
factors, such as building heights, building penetration losses,
street width, distance between buildings etc. which are taken
into account in the Cost 231 WI Model. On the other hand the
Erceg model only considers the Base Station (BS) to
subscriber station (SS) distance along with the BS and the SS
heights, transmission frequency and the tree density.
A number of works can be found in the literature for
propagation model analysis of WiMAX networks. Effect of
different propagation models on a WiMAX network coverage
and throughput at different frequencies were analyzed in [2]
and [3]. Field level analysis is used to predict the best suitable
model for different demographies (e.g. urban, suburban, rural
etc.) at higher frequencies in [4], [5] etc. Link budget analysis
was done for a mobile WiMAX system using the Cost Hata
model in [6]. A detail mathematical analysis of uplink and
downlink coverage of the IEEE 802.16e network was carried
out in [7]. Coverage analysis of urban areas using the Lee
model is presented in [8]. As far as the smart grid network is
concerned, a few works, such as [9] have been carried out to
analyze the propagation models. In [9], Muller et al. assumed
that the metering devices are put inside the buildings and
hence the in-building propagation losses were also taken into
account. This in-building loss was added to the propagation
loss, which was modeled by Cost 231 WI model. However, in
this paper, it is assumed that the antennas of the devices are
put outside of the building, so that there is no in-building loss.
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 2013 Australasian Telecommunication Networks and Applications Conference (ATNAC)

In this work we have carried out propagation modeling for a (3)

city smart grid environment to study the smart meter – – (4)
connectivity in high rise buildings. Smart meters are stationary
Where hm = hroof – hm
devices and their locations are known by the BS. We assume
that the BS database is updated by the electricity utilities when Here, Lori is a correction factor that considers the incident
a new smart meter is connected. In this paper we also propose angle of the radio wave with the street, obtained from different
a IEEE 802.16e (WiMAX) based power ramp up algorithm to sets of measurements, which is given by,
offer 100% connectivity for smart meters in a city –  
environment. The proposed algorithm was simulated in a
{ ( – )  (5)
dense urban area. Simulation results show that the proposed
algorithm can allow the BS to remove the RF (Radio – ( – ) 
Frequency) blind areas thus allowing full connectivity to smart
– (6)
grid devices.
The rest of the paper is organized as follows. Section II The terms Lbsh ka, kd and kf represents the dependency of the
compares the Cost 231 WI and Erceg propagation models. multi-screen diffraction loss on relative height of the BS and
Section III outlines the city smart grid simulation model buildings, distance and radio frequency and are given by,
developed to study a city area smart grid. The proposed power – (  )
{ (7)
ramp up algorithm is described in section IV. Simulation
results are analyzed in section V and finally conclusions are
made in section VI with future works directives.
{ –  (8)
II. OVERVIEW OF COST 231 WI AND ERCEG MODELS – 
A) The Cost 231 Walfisch Ikegami Model
The Cost 231 WI model has three components, namely the {  (9)
–
free space path loss, rooftop to street diffraction and scatter
loss (RTS) and multiple screen diffraction loss (MSD). The ( – )
free space component considers the attenuation caused by the – { (10)
distance a radio wave has to travel from a BS to an SS and ( – )
vice versa. The radio wave also has to propagate through Where –
multiple buildings in the urban area, which makes it scattered.
The RTS component takes this issue into account and B) Erceg Model
determines the corresponding loss. On top of the scattering The Erceg model is based on extensive empirical data. This
loss, the radio wave also suffers from diffraction caused by the model has three categories of terrain recommendation, with
building edges, which lie on the direct path of the wave. The heavy tree density (category A), moderate tree density
buildings are modeled as multiple absorbing screens in the (category B) and light tree density (category C). In dense
model for the determination of the MSD component. The urban scenario, the tree density is lighter and hence, category
input parameters of the Cost 231 WI Model are [10]: C is considered here. The input parameters are:
Table I: Input parameters for Cost 231 WI Model Table II: Input parameters for Erceg Model
d Distance between BS and SS in kilometers d Distance between BS and SS in meters
fc Radio frequency in MHz fc Radio frequency in MHz
b Distance between two adjacent building centers in meters  Wavelength in meters (depends on frequency)
w Street width in meters hb Base station antenna height in meters
hb Base station antenna height in meters hm Subscriber station antenna height in meters
hm Subscriber station antenna height in meters a, b, c Empirical terrain dependent parameters
hroof Building height in meters
 Incident angle in degrees The path loss by Erceg Model [13] for terrain type C is
given by,
For the BS and the SS in the line of sight of each other, the
PL ( ) ( – ) ( )
path loss is given by the following equation, 
Path loss, (1) ( ) – ( ) (11)
For the BS and the SS those are not in line of sight of each The first component of (11) represents the free space path
other, the path loss is the summation of free space loss, RTS loss, which considers the attenuation the radio wave undergoes
loss and MSD loss components. for traveling the distance between a BS and an SS. The second
component is known as the path loss exponent, which is
PL { (2) determined and modeled from extensive empirical data. The
correction factor for higher frequency and the dependency of
Here, the mobile station antenna height is given by the third and

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 2013 Australasian Telecommunication Networks and Applications Conference (ATNAC)

fourth terms respectively. Here, d0 = 100m. For terrain type C,
a = 3.6, b = 0.005, c = 20.
III. CITY SMART GRID MODEL
Fig. 1 shows a typical distribution of smart meters in a city
smart grid where the roads arranged using a Manhattan
architecture. We assume a circular radio cell of 1 km radius.
The BS coverage area is assumed to be divided into 10 zones
according to the distance between the BS and smart meters,
such as zone 1 lies between 0 to 100m from the BS, zone 2
lies between 100 to 200m from the BS and so on. In this work
we initially use a uniform distribution of buildings due to the
Manhattan structure. The network parameters used for the
models are provided in Table III.
Table IV: Terrain parameters used in the simulation models
Average street width 25m
Average Building height 24m (8 × 3)
Average distance between adjacent buildings 50m
Street orientation angle 900
IV. POWER RAMP UP ALGORITHM FOR 100% CONNECTIVITY
When a meter tries to connect to the BS, it uses the initial
ranging channel to send a CDMA code to the BS and
continues sending it with stepped up power until it receives a
transmission opportunity from the BS or reaches its maximum
transmit power. Upon detecting a ranging code successfully,
the BS allocates transmission opportunity to the meter. The
necessary ranging messages (RNG-REQ and RNG-RSP) for
correcting power, timing offset, frequency etc. as well as for
assigning basic and primary Connection Identifiers (CID) are
then negotiated between the BS and the meter [11]. However,
in a dense urban area, if the transmit power of the meters is
used in the range of battery driven mobile devices, the uplink
coverage area would be very low. That is why, a power ramp
up coverage extension algorithm is proposed in this paper, the
flow chart of which is given in Fig. 2.

Start

SS sets its
maximum power to
Pmax0 and reset the
retry count

SSs in set S tries to connect

to BS through initial
ranging up to its maximum
power

BS determines the set Sfailed No

containing the SSs, that
cannot connect
Maximum power /
Fig. 1: Network diagram used for simulation Maximum retry limit Yes
Is Sfailed = exceeded?
Yes
Table III: Network parameters used in the simulation models NULL?
The SS stops
BS transmit power 10 W = 40 dBm All the SSs are communication and
SS transmit power 250 mW = 24 dBm connected to BS No the BS discards the
BS antenna height 40 m SS increases its
SS from set S
Meter antenna height 3m BS broadcasts maximum power by Pstep
WiMAX operating frequency (MHz) 700, 900, 2300 the set Sfailed and increase the number
WiMAX PHY OFDMA of retry count by 1
Number of OFDMA subcarriers 512
Duplexing method TDD
Yes
Subchannel permutation type PUSC
Base station antenna gain 15 dBi Upon reception of the broadcast,
SS checks if it belongs to Sfailed
Smart meter antenna gain –1 dBi
The buildings are considered to have an average number of 8
floors (each floor having 4 apartments), each having 3m No
height. It is assumed that there is one Advanced Metering SS is connected to BS
Infrastructure (AMI) transceiver for every building which and ready to transmit
accumulates data (assumed to be 10 bytes of IP payload from and/or receive data

each meter) from all the 32 apartments in that building and Fig. 2: Power ramp up coverage extension algorithm
communicates with the BS. To accumulate the data from
The devices will start their initial ranging through the initial
different users, a small scale home area network may be used.
ranging uplink contention slots with a certain maximum
The terrain parameters are given as follows:

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transmit power, according to the IEEE 802.16e standard [11]. Here,

The devices which fail to connect to the BS repeat the initial
ranging process by increasing their maximum transmit power
step by step until they succeed or the number of maximum
attempts is reached, whichever occurs earlier. It is assumed
that the BS has knowledge about the anticipated devices (set
S). The BS will periodically broadcast the list (set Sfailed) of the
devices (if any) that exist in the database but have not yet
connected to the BS. The broadcast message is received in the
downlink broadcast channel by all the devices (assuming a
sufficient downlink signal quality), irrespective of their status
and the unsuccessful devices are notified thereby about their
failure so that they can retry with an increased power level
until they reach their maximum limit. It is to be noted that,
since coverage analysis is the primary aim of this paper,
subchannel power allocation, subchannelization gain etc. are
not considered here. Rather it is assumed that all the devices
use a certain transmission power to transmit their data,
regardless of the number of subchannels or subcarriers is used.
V. RESULTS AND ANALYSIS
A) Propagation models analysis
Cost 231 WI model and Erceg C model propagation losses
are compared for different operating frequencies and a BS to
meter distance of 700m and shown in Fig. 3. The propagation
loss in an urban area is affected by the density of buildings,
which is not considered in the Erceg model. Rather, this model
takes only the tree density into account. The Cost 231 WI
model, however, models the building height and separation,
street width and orientation etc., which gives more accurate
result of propagation loss, which is 15-25 dB higher than that
found using the Erceg model.
133.58
SNRRX = Received SNR for required MCS
R = Repetition factor
FS = Sampling frequency in Hz = floor(n ⋅ BW ⁄ ) ,
where BW is the channel bandwidth (5 MHz, 10 MHz and 20
MHz for FFT sizes 512, 1024 and 2048 respectively) and n is
the sampling factor, which is 28/25 for all the bandwidths
stated here.
ImpLoss = Implementation loss
NF = Receiver noise figure
NFFT = Number of subcarriers
Nused = Number of used subcarriers (after subtracting the left
and right guard subcarriers).
For coverage analysis, the minimum SNR required to detect
a radio signal in the receiver is to be considered which, in this
case is 5 dB for QPSK 1/2 convolutions coding [11]. Using
(12) with no repetition coding and assuming a BS noise figure
of 6 dB, an SS noise figure of 10 dB [6], an implementation
loss of 5 dB and the network parameters as per Table III, the
minimum received power for downlink and uplink are listed in
Table V. The other parameters of (12) can be found in [11]
and [12].
Table V: Required receiver sensitivity for QPSK 1/2 MCS
Direction Required receiver sensitivity (dBm)
Downlink –87.4
Uplink –91.5
Fig.4 compares the downlink and uplink received powers for
an operating frequency of 2.3 GHz. The relatively low
transmit power levels of the metering devices result into
significant drop in uplink received power with increasing
distance. Consequently, the uplink coverage is limited to 546.8
m whereas the downlink can cover up to 1.12 km for the Cost

160 231 WI model. As a result, in spite of being located within the

115.38
111.64

109.51

140 downlink coverage area, a number of meters fail to register

98.94
96.11

120 due to falling out of the uplink range. Therefore, enhancing

Erceg C
100 the uplink coverage is the key to increase the effective cell
path loss
80 (dB) radius thereby ensuring successful attachment of all meters.
40
60 Cost 231 DL rx power (Cost 231 WI model)
40 WI path 20 UL rx power (Cost 231 WI model)
DL rx power threshold
20 loss (dB) 0 UL rx power threshold
Received power (dBm)

0 -20

700 900 2300

Frequency (MHz) -40

Fig. 3: Propagation loss of the two models -60

-80
B) Coverage analysis
To analyze the coverage area of the propagation models, the -100

required received power is calculated from the required SNR -120

0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1 1.2 1.4 1.6 1.8 2
values for a certain Modulation and Coding Scheme (MCS) in Distance (KM)

both uplink and downlink directions. According to the IEEE
802.16e standard [11], the receiver minimum sensitivity level,
RSS is related to the received SNR as the following equation:
– –
–
( )
Fig. 4: Received signal strength at different distances from the BS
Two separate smart grid scenarios were simulated, with
uniformly distributed 224 and 400 buildings in a 1 km cell and
a log normal shadow fading of 0 mean and 5 dB standard
deviation. The uniform distribution of the buildings is suitable
(12)
to examine the propagation loss, SNR distribution etc. in an
urban Manhattan area. The details about the buildings and

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meters are provided in section III. The statistics of levels, since the algorithm dictates to step up the power
successfully registered meters for a fixed maximum meter marginally.
transmit power of 250 mW are provided in table VI.
100%
Table VI: Statistics of registered meters
No. of meters Registration Registration Success rate 80%
successful failed
224 139 85 62.05 % 60%
400 277 123 69.25 %
40%
So far, the transmission powers of the meters are used
similarly to battery driven equipment used in traditional 20%
communication network. However, since the AMI devices are
0%
more likely to be run by grid power, their transmit power can 224 400 224 400 224 400 224 400 224 400
be increased to get better uplink coverage. The simulation
Initial Retry 1 Retry 2 Retry 3 Retry 4
results obtained after implementing the power ramp up No. of successful nodes No. of failed nodes
coverage extension algorithm IV are now provided.
Fig. 5: Number of nodes attached to BS vs retries
C) Power ramp up coverage extension algorithm analysis
The parameters used for simulating the power ramp up The average ranging delay as a function of number of retries
coverage extension algorithm are provided in table VII and is shown in Fig. 6. The difference between delays of two
illustrated afterwards. consecutive retry sessions decreases as the index of retry
attempt increases. This is because the number of meters failing
Table VII: Parameters used in power ramp up coverage to register decreases at higher retries attempts.
extension algorithm
Initial maximum transmit power, Pmax0 250 mW 14
Power step size, Pstep 250 mW
12
Maximum ranging retries (overall) 5
Ranging delay (sec)

Maximum ranging retries (inside one ranging retry) 16 10

A metering transceiver starts the initial ranging with 8

224 nodes
maximum transmit power Pmax0 (= 250 mW). It starts sending 6 400 nodes
CDMA ranging code to the BS at half transmit power of Pmax0 4
(= 125 mW) and retries for 16 times, stepping its power up to
2
250 mW (increasing its power 8 mW in each retry) or until a
response received from the BS. After all the meters finish their 0
Initial Retry 1 Retry 2 Retry 3 Retry 4
initial ranging, BS starts broadcasting the Sfailed set (if it is non-
null) through the broadcast channel periodically, which Fig. 6: Initial ranging delay at different retry sessions
consists of the list of meters that could not register. The meters
The transmit power density statistics were also collected
on the list increases their maximum power by the step size,
after all the devices are connected to the BS (i.e. after the 4th
Pstep (= 250 mW) and starts initial ranging again from the
retry session) for both meter density values and plotted in Fig.
maximum power of previous step (= 250 mW). After this retry
7. Most of the devices (more than 75%) in both cases can
session, the Sfailed set will likely have fewer elements than
register to the BS at less than 500 mW transmit power. This is
before. The meters of the Sfailed set after 2 retries will again
because the proposed power ramp up algorithm affects the cell
step up their maximum power by Pstep (yielding a maximum
edge meters more. Only a few devices must step up their
power of 750 mW) and start initial ranging from 500 mW.
transmit power to 1 W or more, which ensures that the overall
Thus, the process will go on for 5 times (up to a maximum
network energy consumption does not increase much.
transmit power of 1.25 W). After that, if Sfailed is still non-null,
the BS discards the members of Sfailed from set S, since these 250
meters are out of coverage of the BS. The meters also stop 224 nodes
200
communicating with the BS.
Number of nodes

400 nodes
150
Significant improvement in device attachment and SNR
distribution can be achieved through the proposed algorithm. 100
The first initial ranging try session is named as initial and the
50
next 4 retries are marked from retry 1 to retry 4. The results of
number of devices attached to the BS for a total of 224 nodes 0
0 - 100
100 - 200
200 - 300
300 - 400
400 - 500
500 - 600
600 - 700
700 - 800
800 - 900
900 - 1000
1000 - 1100
1100 - 1200
1200 - 1300

and 400 nodes are provided in Fig. 5. It is seen from the figure
that the power ramp up algorithm can ensure that 100%
devices are connected to the BS for different meter densities,
Tx power (mW)
yet all the devices are operating at their minimum power
Fig. 7: Transmit power density of meters

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 2013 Australasian Telecommunication Networks and Applications Conference (ATNAC)
Last of all, the average uplink SNR distribution of the
meters without and with algorithm are analysed. For this
analysis, the 1 km cell was divided into 10 zones as explained
in section III. The results are provided in Fig. 8 and Fig. 9 for
different meter densities. To simulate the results without the
algorithm, a fixed maximum transmit power of 750 mW for all
devices was used, since this is the middle point of the
maximum power range (250 mW – 1250 mW) with the
algorithm. It is observed from Fig. 8 and 9 that the uplink
SNR is improved for the cell edge meters (zone 10). For a
fixed maximum transmit power, the uplink SNR at cell edge is
below 5 dB, which makes the radio signal undetectable at the
BS, yielding that these meters are out of coverage. The power
ramp up coverage extension algorithm improves the cell edge
uplink SNR and thus the meters stay inside the coverage area
of the BS. Moreover, for low meter density, the SNR of the
moderate channel condition region (zones 4 – 7 for 224 nodes)
are decreased to an optimum level by the algorithm because of
stepping up the power minimally.
25
20
Uplink SNR (dB)
15
10
5 pp. 1-6.
0 Mobile WiMAX System in Azumino City," in Global
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
Zone
With algorithm Without algorithm
Fig. 8: Uplink SNR distribution (224 nodes)
25
20
Uplink SNR (dB)
15
10
5 [10]
0 Report," 1999.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
Zone
With algorithm Without algorithm
Fig. 9: Uplink SNR distribution (400 Nodes)
VI. CONCLUSIONS
In this paper, a power ramp up algorithm is proposed for
coverage extension of a smart grid in a dense urban area. The
results are achieved for the Cost 231 Walfisch Ikegami Model,
which is a well-known model for urban scenario. Results show
that the uplink coverage, which is the bottleneck of the BS
coverage area, can be increased significantly by implementing
the proposed power ramping algorithm. The power step up
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size, the maximum power levels and the number of initial
ranging retries can be chosen through testing by different
values in real networks, since different values may be suitable
for different scenario and terrain. Since the metering
transceivers are run by the grid power, the increased amount
of transmit power is well affordable.
The authors would like to extend their work to the multi BS
scenario and investigate the cell-to-cell interference for
increased power level of the meters after implementing the
algorithm.
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