Abstract
Infrastructure of Smart Grid system relies on communication between electricity producer and consumer domain. Consumer domain consists of Neighborhood Area Network which connects smart meters installed at homes or businesses of consumers, Home Area Network which connects all appliances at home to Utility AMI Network (on producer side). Few candidates or protocols considered for implementing Neighborhood Area Network (NAN) are Cellular communication, IEEE 802.11, 802.16, 802.15.4, Optical fiber network, Power line network. Project aims to provide an analysis on Cellular data communication protocol considering its different standards, implementation details, advantages, disadvantages, security issues, reliability, time critical communication, maintenance, power, and cost factors. Studies are conducted on standards in Cellular communication such as CDMA, GSM, (2G) UMTS, WCDMA (3G) and 4G protocols and gauge factors of bandwidth, coverage, and resource usage and identify effective and efficient way to implement NAN. Analysis on Short Message Service (SMS) which is preferred mode for communication in NAN is carried out. Project intends to identify potential issues which affect the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of information flow through cellular communication channel when it is implemented in the Smart Grid. Investigations are carried out on application of information security best practice(s) to NAN in Smart grid and to what extent they are applied. Comparisons are done on different candidate protocols for NAN and make few recommendations, identify few research areas and open issues if any.