Research on Optical Internet-of-Things for Informalization Development of Modern Power Grids

The power grid industry is experiencing a fast informalization development to meet the goal of transformation to a first-class energy interconnection enterprise. For example, the State Grid Corporation of China (SGCC) comprises three stages of development, namely, SG-ERP 1.0 (SG186), SG-ERP 2.0, and SG-ERP 3.0, and its information system is now the largest of its kind in the world. Various information technologies contributed to the construction of the solid foundation of this system. As we are moving toward the new era of grid development, novel techniques are urgently needed. Optical Internet-of-things (OIoT) is one of these methods that is a more secure, intelligent, economical, and efficient network updated version of the traditional internet-of-things (IoT) based on optical wireless connections. It can satisfactorily address the needs of future IoT from the power grid industry, and can be extensively applied to information services for power grids for transmission control, equipment maintenance, device manufacturing, metering, imaging, sensing, and navigation. This paper describes the fundamental theories associated with this technique, as well as its advantages of high-transmission speeds, cost-effectiveness, and electromagnetic interference compatibility. Then the authors developed an Finite Element Analysis method to explore and evaluate the performance of the OIoT technique, and proposed several typical applications based on their research work of deploying OIoT for ensuring reliable equipment status monitoring in high voltage and strong electro-magnetic interference environments, providing accurate wireless navigation in unmanned power operation scenarios, and establishing high-speed information system with existing electrical infrastructure.