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Data traffic analysis of utility smart metering network

Conference Paper · January 2013

DOI: 10.1109/PESMG.2013.6672750

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 Data Traffic Analysis of Utility Smart Metering
Network
Wenpeng Luan, SMIEEE Duncan Sharp, MIEEE
wenpeng.luan@bchydro.com duncan.sharp@bchydro.com
Smart Metering Program
BC Hydro
Burnaby, BC, Canada
Abstract— This paper examines an implemented practical utility
AMI network, analyzes meter data size and data traffic volume
in several key AMI system nodes such the smart meter, meter
data collector, data center firewall, metering system head-end,
and meter data repository. Acknowledging that AMI solutions
are different from utility to utility and therefore the data traffic
volume and pattern flow through each AMI network will be
different depending on the metering system and its
implementation, this study provides a practical reference and
traffic benchmark for future AMI project planning and
implementation.
Index Terms—Smart Meters, Smart Grid, Advanced Metering
Infrastructure (AMI), Communication Networks, Data Traffic
Analysis.
I. INTRODUCTION
Advanced Metering Infrastructure (AMI) is an integrated
software and hardware system comprising the following key
elements: smart meters, a two-way communication network
and a meter data repository and meter data management
system (MDMS). AMI automatically collects interval meter
data from end customers and shares them with various IT
applications in the utility back end. AMI provides system-
wide measurement and visibility, so it is often considered as
first step towards smart grid [1].
As most utilities are expecting to leverage the common
communication and IT infrastructure built through their AMI
implementation, understanding the data flow and
communication traffic volume in the AMI network has
significant value for utility infrastructure planning.
There have been several studies [2]-[4] projecting the data
volume and communication bandwidth requirements for
planned AMI networks. However, the authors are unaware of
any published analysis on real world AMI system operations.
This paper aims to fill in this gap by analyzing data volumes
and traffic flow sizes seen in several key components in an
operational AMI network. Our motivation is to provide
references for future AMI implementation planning.
The paper is organized as follows. After this introductory
section, Section II describes the overall solution architecture
Stephen LaRoy
stephen.laroy@bchydro.com
of BC Hydro’s Smart Metering Program [5], and explains the
approaches taken in this paper for the data traffic analysis.
Results associated with identified nodes in the metering
network are presented and discussed in Section III, which is
followed by a brief conclusion in Section IV.
II. DATA TRAFFIC ANALYSING APPROACH
A. BC Hydro Smart Metering Solution Achitecture
BC Hydro is nearing completion of its Smart Metering
Program, with all 1.9 million customer meters on schedule to
be installed across the province by the end of 2012. A high-
level simplified system architecture is shown in Figure 1.
From the figure, the major system elements include customer
smart meters, Neighborhood Area Network (NAN), meter data
collector, Wide Area Network (WAN), and head end
components including firewalls, Automated Data Collection
System (ADCS) and various other applications. In terms of
scale, the 1.9 million meters are served by about 1,700
collectors. Although the average number of meters per
collector is close to one thousand, depending on NAN
customer density and cluster size, the range is from under 100
to approximately 2,000 meters per collector.
Like many other utilities in North America, BC Hydro’s
smart metering system employs a 900MHZ unlicensed RF
mesh solution for the metering NAN. Data from smart meters
in each NAN are aggregated at the NAN collector and then
backhauled to the data center via the WAN. Currently most of
the meter collectors use commercial cellular mobile service
for WAN backhaul. Beyond cellular coverage, the WAN can
also be provided by community level Internet Service
Providers (ISP) and, as a last resort, by satellite service to a
pole-top mounted terminal. Use of WiMAX radio technology
as a WAN edge network is also on the roadmap, and has been
undergoing extensive trials. The head end ADCS polls meter
data three times a day following a predefined schedule. From
the ADCS, the data is published on the Enterprise Service Bus
(ESB), which passes the data to the Meter Data Management
System (MDMS) and other applications in the data center;
eventually all data is stored in Data Repository (DR).
 ESB Smart meters at the customer service locations record register
data, load profile data, voltage monitoring profile data, other
OMS Smart meter instrumentation profile measurement, and event detection
DMS Collector
logs. These data will support customer billing, outage
F response, system monitoring and optimization, and many
MDMS other applications. Depending on the meter and customer type,
Sat WAN . V NAN the measurement quantity and reading intervals are different.
DR LAN Cell WAN M As an example, residential meters are normally configured to
ADCS record the hourly interval profile. These hourly profiles are
uploaded to the data center three times a day and the register
A readings once. Table I lists the configured meter attributes in
DHCP -- C B
AAA -- D typical residential meters.
E
NMS -- TABLE I METER ATTRIBUTE EXAMPLE
DNS --
Data / Traffic Measurement Points
PresentRegister SelfReadRegister Interval Data
LEGEND Ins V(a) ccum W d max V(a)
A Meter data download
Router B Cell WAN monthly usage from billing Ins Watts Delivered Aggregate cum W d min V(a)
C Sat WAN daily usage logging Number of Demand Resets max W d VARh Q1
Firewall D Packet sniffer on data center firewall Number of Inversion Tampers VARh d Vh(a)
E Automated data collection system Number of minutes on battery VARh r Wh d
F Data repository carryover
Number of Power Outages Wh d
Figure 1 Simplified meter network architecture showing data/traffic Number of Removal Tampers Wh r
measurements points Number of times programmed

B. Data Traffic Analysis Approach
The data size and traffic volume were directly measured at
the meter system nodes identified in Figure 1. These include:
(A) Smart Meters: the data source where interval
measurements are taken and stored at customer service
locations.
(B) WAN: network usage data was obtained from cellular
mobile monthly billing.
(C) WAN: network usage data was obtained from simple
usage monitoring tools for the satellite service.
(D) Data center firewall: a packet sniffer was used to
capture traffic flows. The capture point is inside the
firewall allowing the network overhead traffic to be
identified and analyzed.
(E) Automated data collection system (ADCS): a packet
sniffer was used in the meter lab to capture various meter
data payloads arriving at the ADCS.
(F) Data repository (DR): Daily meter data volume in the
production DR was directly measured with 1.6 million
meters read.
Data and traffic measurements from each of these nodes
were analyzed separately and then, to ensure there was a
reasonable correlation in terms of data volumes, the data were
analyzed together. This correlation provides confidence in the
accuracy of the independent measurements.
III. ANALYSING RESULTS
A. Smart Meters
Of the approximately 1.9 million customers, about 90%
are residential and 10% are commercial and light industrial.
Data can be ported directly from a smart meter using an
optical meter reading tool. Based on analysis of meter data
extracted from a typical residential meter, the average meter
traffic generated (sent) per day is on the order of 3,185 bytes
(in contrast, it receives 272 bytes/day) , or approximately 93.3
kilo bytes per 30 day month. This includes application and
network layer overheads in addition to the meter data. This
correlates reasonably well with overall meter communication
statistics obtained from the data center, which indicate that the
average daily data exchange is about 3,275 bytes per day, of
which more than 90% is outgoing and less than 10%
incoming.
B. Cellular Mobile Wide Area Network
The cellular WAN service providers' monthly bill
itemizes usage per cellular modem in the smart meter data
collector. The WAN traffic includes: (i) metering system data
exchanges between each meter and the ADCS – both
scheduled and on-demand; (ii) WAN overhead on each
metering system data packet including headers for TCP/IP,
IPsec tunnel and VPN tunnel; (iii) control and management
overhead traffic for the NAN collector; and (iv) software
update pushes to the NAN collector and to the meters.
The monthly usage, in mega bytes (MB) for each cellular
modem, is mapped to the number of meters associated with
the modem (i.e., NAN collector). This data can be shown as a
scatter plot of monthly usage versus the number of meters --
see Figure 2 for an example.
Although a blunt instrument, a regression analysis of the
scatter plot can be used to estimate the metering system
traffic per meter per month and the overhead traffic
associated with the NAN collector. Specifically, the y-axis
intercept is the NAN collector overhead traffic and the slope
of the line is the metering system traffic per month per meter.
 700
Data per collector (MB)
600
500
400
300
200
100
0
0 500 1000 1500 2000 2500
Number of meters per collector
Figure 2 Scatter plot of the cellular WAN data volume per month per NAN
collector (CGR) versus number of meters per collector
From the example in Figure 2, as shown in the blue line,
the collector overhead traffic is on the order of 200 MB per
month and the metering system traffic is on the order of 100
kilo bytes (kB) per month per meter.
Figure 2 also shows 16 collectors received firmware
updates in this month, when a firmware package around 185
MB was pushed to each of them. To avoid skewing the steady
state statistics, the regression analysis excluded the collectors
that were upgraded.
C. Satellite Mobile Wide Area Network
The satellite WAN comprises a space segment and a
terrestrial tail segment. The terrestrial segment consists of a
VPN connection from the satellite provider’s point of
presence (POP) to the ADCS in the BC Hydro data center.
The pole-top satellite terminals create detailed Call Data
Records (CDRs), enabling a granular view of the WAN
traffic for each router. A web portal tool was used to access
the CDR data. The number of meters reporting through each
collector on the satellite WAN were obtained using an
application available through the ADCS.
The satellite service began with a field trial to two
collectors -- one collector serving an isolated NAN (i.e., the
meters in the cluster can only reach one collector), and one on
the edge of a large NAN mesh served by multiple collectors
(i.e., meters near this collector can reroute depending on the
availability of the collector and its associated WAN). These
were monitored closely after activation. Figures 3 and 4 plot
the average data throughput per day over the satellite and the
number of meter reads attempted. The number of meter reads
attempted represents the number of meters that the ADCS
believes should be reporting to the collector. The “chunky”
piece-wise nature of the graphs is an artifact of the
monitoring tool granularity and subsequent averaging.
When these satellite terminals were first installed, the
NAN 900MHz mesh on the collector was disabled. The
terminals remained connected for approximately two weeks
before the mesh was enabled. During this time, the only
WAN traffic consisted of collector management overhead. As
shown in Figures 3 and 4, this was approximately 6 MB per
day. This observed overhead is generally consistent with the
overhead for the cellular WAN derived in Figure 2.
No upgrade
Linear (No upgrade)
Upgraded
3000 3500
f(x) = 0.083x + 193.673
R² = 0.811
Figure 3 Graph of satellite WAN daily average data volume and meter count
for a collector in an isolated NAN
Figure 4 Graph of satellite WAN daily average data volume and meter count
for a collector on the edge of large multi-collector NAN
The graphs in Figures 3 and 4 are interesting when taken
in context with subsequent events. Once the 900MHz mesh
radios were enabled, nearby meters began to associate with
the collectors and register with the ADCS, accompanied by a
corresponding increase in WAN traffic. The satellite service
provider’s POP in the Atlantic region experienced a brief
power outage followed by extended network issues associated
with storm damage from Hurricane Sandy; these problems
began on November 2nd, and continued for approximately 5
days. These network outages caused a failure of the terrestrial
tail VPN. Because the satellite connections to the collectors
were still active, the collectors continued to transmit data
attempting to re-establish connectivity with the head end. The
meters associated with the collector in Figure 3, being
isolated from any other collectors, remained associated with
the collector during the WAN outage. However, the meters
associated with the collector in Figure 4 had alternate routes
through the mesh to a cellular-connected collector. During the
outage, these meters re-associated themselves with this
alternative. Once the WAN connection was restored, the
meters began migrating back to the satellite-connected
collector as they became aware of more optimal paths
through the mesh.
Another anomaly in the network traffic was discovered on
November 13, but it only affected the satellite-connected
collector in Figure 3. An explanation for the traffic anomaly
is under investigation as this paper was finalized.
D. Firewall Packet Capture
The sniffer inside the firewall captured packets after the
network security provisions had been removed. This allowed
the various network overhead traffic flows to be identified.
Analysis of this data is relatively time consuming, and a 4
hour window on one of the collectors was used as a
representative sample. From this, the collector's monthly
WAN overhead traffic is approximately 202 mega-bytes (note
that this excludes meter payload and associated overheads).
Based on 50 minute network management reporting intervals,
Table II breaks the overhead traffic down by type.
TABLE II BREAKDOWN OF COLLECTOR WAN OVERHEAD
TRAFFIC
Traffic flow type Percent of total
Network management 78.7%
Security controls related
Network time protocol 12.5%
Domain name system (DNS)
E. ADCS Headend
Smart meter data is transmitted in ANSI C12.22 format. A
close look at the ANSI C12.22 meter data payload gathered at
the monitoring point next to the ADCS has been done in the
BC Hydro meter lab. The following table lists the incoming
data packet counts and total data payload size in ANSI C12.22
format for a single phase residential meter in a single day,
with different combinations of data records read from the
meter.
TABLE III DAILY METER DATA PAYLOAD
Meter Attributes Packet Data Payload
Counts (bytes)
Register, Load Profile 2 889
Register, Load Profile, Voltage Monitoring, 2 1,095
Instantaneous Data
Register, Load Profile, Voltage Monitoring, 4 1,920
Instantaneous Data, Event Log, Prior Self Read
Register, Load Profile, Voltage Monitoring, 5 2,740
Instantaneous Data, Event Log, Prior Self Read,
Demand Rest, Communication Log, Network
Statistics
G. Discussion
There is good correlation between the data obtained at the
different points in the system. This provides confidence in the
accuracy of the overall assessment of the data and traffic
levels.
If the collector WAN overhead traffic is taken as a ratio of
the meter payload traffic, it represents a significant overhead -
- specifically, for a collector with the system-wide average of
1,000 associated meters, the WAN overhead at 200 MB is
twice the meter data of 100 MB (from 100 kB per meter times
1,000 meters). Over 75% of this overhead is from the network
management system. Due to the relatively high cost of WAN
bandwidth, in particular the satellite bandwidth, these network
7.1%
overheads are being examined in detail with the collector
vendor.
1.7%
IV. CONCLUSION
This paper analyzes the data volumes and traffic flow in
selected system nodes in a practical utility AMI network.
Meter data size and traffic volumes are directly measured and
investigated in the smart meter, data center firewall, head-end,
and meter data repository. Service provider billing information
and monitoring tools are used to analyze the WAN traffic on
smart meter data collectors both with cellular services and
satellite services. Acknowledging that AMI solutions are
different from utility to utility, and consequently the data
traffic volume and flow patterns through the AMI network
will differ depending on the metering system and/or each
utility’s implementation, the findings from this analysis can
provide a practical reference for future AMI project planning
and implementation work.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The authors gratefully acknowledge that many individuals
in the BC Hydro Smart Metering Project team, especially
Darren Parko, Chris Evans, Vern Kwiatkowski, Gord Mason,
Terry Ricks, Russell Barilea, Eliza Yiu, Joshua Peng, Ryan
Planinshek, Wayne Cross, contributed to this work and made
this paper possible.

The volume and size of the Event logs and [1]
Communication Logs maybe different from meter to meter,
[2]
and the size and volume of other meter records will be same
for all meters with the same meter type. The data presented in [3]
this table can be good estimate for most of the meters in the
system.
[4]
F. Data Repository
All data collected by the smart metering system is stored in
the data repository (DR) in the data center. When the system [5]
had 1.6 million meters read, the data repository accumulated
11 giga bytes (GB) of data per day, which divided into
approximately 60% data and 40% index.
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CRA International, “Cost Benefits Analysis of Smart Metering and
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W.P. Luan, D. Sharp, and S. Lancashire, “Smart Grid Communication
Network Capacity Planning for Power Utilities”, proceedings of IEEE
PES T&D Conference 2010, April 2010, New Orleans, Florida
Engage Consulting Ltd, “High Level Smart Meter Data Traffic
Analysis for ENA”, May 2010, [Online]. Available:
http://www.energynetworks.org/modx/assets/files/electricity/futures/sm
art_meters/ENA-CR008-001-1 4_Data Traffic Analysis.pdf
BC Hydro. (2011). “Smart Metering and Infrastructure Program
Business Case” [Online]. Available:
http://www.bchydro.com/etc/medialib/internet/documents/smi/smi_busi
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