COMPARISON OF RADIO FREQUENCY (RF) TO POWER LINE CARRIER (PLC)

COMMUNICATION IN PREPAYMENT REVENUE MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS

1. Cost of the PLC system is greater than the RF solution.

solution
This is due to the nature of the electronic components being used in the circuitry.. PLC requires the use of
isolation and coupling transformers that are both expensive and bulky. The electronic microchip solutions that
exist today, that cover the various frequency bands, are
a significantly more expensive than their RF counterparts.
The cost difference can amount to approximately 400%.

2. A PLC meter requires a larger power supply unit than a RF meter meter.
The larger power supply is required to provide more power to the PLC signal for any significant range to be
obtained. The RF solution requires very little power in comparison,
comparison, and in the case of Conlog’s RF meter it is
limited to 10mW.. This obviously assists with maintaining a lower burden on the meter. The power required ffor
PLC communications is typically 100 times greater.

3. The electronic circuitry of the PLC solution is significantly more complex than the RF solution.
In electronic circuitry design, it is a well known rule that reliability is directly related to circuit
circuit complexity - the more
complex a circuit, the more likely it is to fail. This directly translates into RF being a more reliable technology for
communications.

4. RF provides the Utility with greater flexibility for operating and maintaining the meter network.
RF allows the Utility the flexibility to use Drive-By
Drive and Walk-by for meter
er reading. It also allows the Utility to stand
outside a home and query meters without having to plug into the network.

5. The quality of the appliances that the consumer connects connects to his mains supply directly affects the
reliability of the PLC communications.
The impact of inductive ballasts (for use in fluorescent lighting) and any equipment that introduces harmonics onto
the network plays havoc with PLC systems. Probably the the single most important difference between the two
technologies is the fact that with PLC, the efficacy of the system is not only reliant on the quality of the network,
but more importantly, on what the consumer decides to connect to the mains! It has been n observed that ccheap
Chinese appliances (like TV's) have very poor switch-mode
switch mode supplies that are not filtered, and as a result feed very
noisy signals onto the network. On these occasions
o it has been necessary to have filters fitted in order to reduce
the effect of this interference. Filters add additional cost and are typically very expensive (they are not included in
the initial cost of the PLC meter, and this comes as a surprise to the Utility when filters are required to be fitted.
The fitting of a filter also does not guarantee reliable communications.) This means that the Utility cannot
guarantee the reliability of the PLC system after installation - it may work well immediately after installation, but
fails at a later date when the consumer starts adding appliances.

6. Global use of RF.

The use of RF as a communication technology is well established across many different applications throughout
the world. Although it is possible to interfere with a RF system, it is far immune from interference when compared
with PLC. Car alarms, garage door openers, house alarms, gate controllers are all operating on the ISM band
worldwide. There are millions of these in operation and one does not hear of mass interference problems.

7. Communication range.
It is quite plausible to get range of a few hundreds of meters with RF - the same cannot be said with PLC. In many
cases there are transformers on the network which are an effective barrier to PLC communications in many
cases. RF communication signal nal strength can be maximized
zed by locating the transmitter / receiver in the best
possible location, while PLC does not have this flexibility. RF expanders / boosters can also be deploye
deployed within
the network to ensure reliable communications. Typically a RF booster services many meters.
meters.

19 September 2012

Conlog (Pty) Ltd

Non Executive Directors:
P O Box 2332, Durban, 4000, South Africa M J Madungandaba, Dr T Mokgokong, C Kleynhans, G Schoebel**, E Bou
Bou-Chahine***
Tel +27 (31) 268-1111 Fax +27 (31) 268-1500
** French ***Lebanese