Choice of Ict Infrastructures and Technologies in Smart Grid Planning

The planning process of energy networks must consider the increased levels of decentralized intermittent renewable energy systems and new loads, e.g. Electric Vehicles (EVs). A distribution grid planning tool must address these new challenges, requiring methods to deal with the increased levels of uncertainty and new trends in observability and controllability of the network. Thus, an essential part of future distribution networks is ICT, which enables enhanced monitoring and control options. This paper presents an approach for ICT planning as part of a distribution grid planning process. The outcome of the ICT planning is a set of ICT solutions for the smart grid. This is implemented as a two-step method, where first the ICT planning module provides a pre-selection of certain smart grid applications, which are mapped to expected communication and technology requirements. In the second step, concrete ICT solutions specific to a given energy network are identified to fulfill needs such as speed, reliability or costs for combinations of wired and wireless ICT communication technologies.