System for Utility Meter Communications Using a Single RF Frequency

The present invention relates to automatic and remote meter reading systems, of the type used in the utility industry. In particular, the invention relates to radio frequency ("RF") systems used to communicate with metering devices of the type used in the utility (i.e., gas, water, electricity, and heat) industries.

Heretofore, devices of various types have been used for automatic meter reading ("AMIR") and for Remote Meter Reading ("RMR") by RF means. Such devices have included handheld reader/programmers, vans which contain RF reading equipment, and fixed RF network systems, together with computerized equipment for reading and storing meter readings. The prior art devices operated both in an unlicensed mode and on licensed RF channels.

As used herein, the various types of RF systems will be referred to as being of type Class 1, which means that the RF equipment is full duplex; Class 2, which means that it is half-duplex; Class 3, which means that it is a so-called one and one-half way system; and Class 4, which means that it is a one-way system. By way of example, a battery operated RF system of the type which was heretofore used to read gas utility meters required that the equipment go to "sleep" between reads in order to conserve battery power. When a van passed through the area, it sent out a "wake-up" signal which caused the Encoder/Receiver/Transmitters (i.e., the ERTs) in the area to respond by transmitting encoded signals containing the metering data and any stored tamper signals. Using the above definitions, these ERT units were Class 3 devices. When similar devices were introduced into the electricity industry by companies like Schlumberger Industries, Inc., they were changed from battery operation to AC operation in order to take advantage of the fact that electric power was available. Initially, such devices as the Schlumberger R-200 operated with a "wake-up" signal from the van, and that signal caused the R-200 ERT to send out the encoded signals to the van in a Class 3 mode. Later devices, such as the Schlumberger R-300 Encoder/Transmitter, made use of the available AC power to continuously transmit without the need for a "wake-up" signal, i.e., they operated in a Class 4 mode.

A limitation of the foregoing devices, however, is that either Class 3 or Class 4 operation is limited to AMR applications, i.e., they can be used to encode and transmit metering data, but as they are not two-way systems, they cannot be used for a variety of applications in which utilities have expressed interest.

By way of example, utilities use AMR systems in order to allow for timely reads of customer's meters on a scheduled and/or demand basis, without requiring access to the customer premises. However, in Class 3 and Class 4 operation these applications are of limited use as either a van or a meter reader with a handheld RF meter reader must be sent out to the area where the meters are located, due to the relatively short range of the RF transmissions. Due to the increasing demand for new features, such as outage detection reporting, tamper detection, remote disconnect, and other distribution automation and demand side management ("DA/DSM") applications, two-way systems (i.e., Class 1 or Class 2), in which specific meters can be addressed and can respond, have been desirable.

While such two-way systems could be developed using the same type of van or handheld technology, it makes more sense to develop fixed network two-way systems, so that a request to read a particular meter from a central office would not require that anyone be dispatched to the area by van (or with a handheld) to actually read the meter. Due to the cost of fixed network systems, there has been a continued demand to support functions other than basic meter reading and to support a large number of different metering devices, i.e., electric, water, gas, and heat metering devices, as well as a large number of meters, in order to help spread the cost of the fixed network.

An approach which has been taken in fixed network systems is to use a cellular arrangement of "concentrators" which can communicate with the meters or meter interface units ("MIUs") within their respective cells. As will be understood by those skilled in the art, each cell typically contains a single concentrator along with several hundreds, or thousands, of MIUs. This scheme has a number of limitations if each MIU is a full two-way communicating device and a request/answer scheme is used to read each of them, with each transaction requiring that the concentrator initiate the transaction by requesting that a specific MIU answer the concentrator's request for a meter reading. Serial polling of MIUs, using a request/answer scheme, even to simply obtain meter readings, is extremely time consuming. Further, as each concentrator is provided with a radiating system located in an optimum position to ensure the concentrator's coverage within its cell, i.e., by placing the antenna in a highly elevated location, it is likely that the concentrators of neighboring cells will "hear" each other and cause interference if they are using the same RF frequency at the same time. In the past, this has meant that either more than one RF frequency must be used, which leads to further expense on the part of the utility, or that some type of time division channel access be used. In the former case, the need for multiple RF channels has been cost prohibitive, while in the latter case, the time multiplexing further adds to the time that it takes to simply poll the meters for AMR purposes.

Due to the number of transactions per cell, which is comparable to the number of meters in the case of AMR, but increased by any additional system demands, i.e., load survey, and due to the time it takes for a request/answer transaction, each concentrator will keep its RF frequency ("channel") busy for a period of time during which no other relatively close cells can use the same RF channel. Thus, when using the fixed network schemes of the prior art on a single channel, there were limitations as to the number of cells which could be read on any given day. In certain geographical areas it is difficult to meet the requirements of simply performing the basic AMR operation, together with a limited amount of load survey operations in a reasonable amount of time. Further, all fixed network cellular systems required a rather complex scheme for handling the concentrator access to the channel, and the schemes used were strongly dependent upon cell configuration.

Based upon the foregoing considerations, the number of readings which could be performed by the cellular configurations of the prior art were limited based upon the number of MIUs in the cell, the time taken for each transaction, and the applications, i.e., AMR and load survey, which needed to be performed. They were further limited by the geography of the territory, as geography often determines the distance between concentrators.

In view of the foregoing problems, a new approach to using a fixed network system is required.

In contrast to the strict request/answer single channel schemes of the prior art, in which the concentrators from adjacent interfering cells could not be used simultaneously, the present invention uses a unique system approach to optimize the primary concentrator time consuming tasks of AMR and load survey.

In the preferred embodiment of the present invention this is accomplished by eliminating the use of the individual request/answer scheme of the prior art in which each MIU was individually polled by the concentrator within its cell to obtain its stored meter reading, with similar polling occurring for both metering and load survey applications.

Instead, in accordance with the present invention, for each AMR schedule and/or load survey schedule, the concentrator in each cell transmits only once, at the beginning of the schedule. That transmission is a general call to all of the MIUs in the cell to respond with their respective meter readings. By having the concentrators in adjacent cells simultaneously broadcast their general request for all MIUs to respond, any adjacent cell concentrator interference is eliminated. In accordance with the present invention, the MIUs within each cell are programmed to transmit their response to the concentrator's MIU request in a serial fashion, i.e., each MIU is assigned a separate time to respond to the concentrator's request. These times are individually indexed, thereby avoiding MIU/MIU interference within each cell. As the definition of a cell means that MIU-to-neighboring-data concentrator unit ("DCU") interference should not exist, the scheme of the present invention provides for simultaneous use of a single channel by adjacent cells.

In an alternative embodiment, it is possible to have potentially conflicting DCUs controlled by the utility's central office to space out the transmissions of their general calls to the MIUs, and, if desired, to program the MIUs in each cell to respond only to the general request of the DCU in its own cell.

In the Drawing:

FIG. 1 illustrates a typical fixed network cellular system of the type referred to herein;

FIG. 2 is a flow chart which shows the prior art method of interrogating MIUs by a DCU;

FIG. 3 is a Table which illustrates the problems with performing MIU reads using the conventional request/answer scheme of the prior art;

FIG. 4 is a timing diagram further illustrating the problem of performing MIU reads using the conventional request/answer scheme of the prior art;

FIG. 5 is a timing diagram which illustrates the way the present inventive method operates in performing reads and/or load survey operations;

FIG. 6 is a table which illustrates the manner in which the present inventive method is able to save a substantial amount of time in performing MIU reads;

FIG. 7 is a table which illustrates the way the present inventive method is able to save a substantial amount of time when load surveys are being performed;

FIGS. 8 and 9 are tables which illustrate the way the present invention can be used with a mix of Class 2 and Class 4 MIUs; and

FIG. 10 is a block diagram of an MIU in accordance with the present invention.

As described above, the present invention relates to an automatic meter reading ("AMR") system of the type used for reading utility (water, gas, electric, and/or heat) meters by using a fixed RF network.

Referring to FIG. 1, a portion of a fixed RF cellular network 10 is shown. The portion of the network 10 which is illustrated is comprised of nineteen cells, 12, 14, 16, 18, 20, 22, 24, 26, 28, 30, 32, 34, 36, 40, 42, 44, 46, 48. However, those skilled in the art will recognize that an actual network could be comprised of either a fewer or greater number of cells.

Each of the cells in the network 10 typically contains a single Data Concentrator Unit ("DCU"), such as the DCUs which are shown schematically by the antenna symbols 50, 52 shown in the innermost cell 12, and in adjacent cell 14, respectively. Further, each cell will typically have a large number, i.e., from hundreds to thousands of Meter Interface Units ("MIUs"), such as the MIUs 54, 56 which are in cell 12.

As will be recognized by those skilled in the art, given the adjacent locations of various cells, i.e., cells 12, 14, each containing relatively high powered DCUs 50, 52, respectively, if the DCUs are using the same RF frequency at the same times, there is a good possibility that there will be DCU/DCU interference. This is particularly true given that some overlap of adjacent cells is necessary in order to insure proper geographic coverage of all areas within each of the cells. In fact DCUs in cells as far away as two cell diameters (referred to herein as "relatively adjacent" cells), i.e., cells 12 and 48 (as shown in FIG. 1), can interfere due the high power of the DCUs and their geographical locations.

The prior networks avoided this type of problem either by using different RF frequencies for adjacent (and relatively adjacent) cells, or, alternatively, using time displacement of transmissions in adjacent (and relatively adjacent) cells. Unfortunately, when one is operating a two-way (Class 1 or Class 2) system in which both the DCUs and the MIUs are able to initiate RF communications, the number of RF frequencies (channels) which must be employed in order to prevent DCU/DCU interference is quite large, i.e., due to the potential for DCU/DCU interference between the DCUs in relatively adjacent cells, about nineteen different RF frequencies would be required in a typical network cell configuration, as shown in FIG. 1. As can be readily understood, it is very costly to obtain licensing for nineteen channels and to maintain equipment which could be operated on nineteen different channels. On the other hand, the use of one RF channel together with time displacement would require that as much as nineteen times the time for a single cell would be needed.

Referring to FIG. 2, a flow chart illustrating the procedure used to perform various functions is shown. In a "typical" highly populated system, as depicted in FIG. 1 and explained more fully with reference to FIGS. 3 and 4, there might be about 2,000,000 MIUs. These may be comprised of MIUs for reading gas, water, electricity, and/or heat meters, and they are all assumed to be operating in a Class 2 mode. By way of example, there may be about 6,000 meters (gas, water, electricity, and/or heat) per concentrator (i.e., 6,000 MIUs per cell).

Referring to the flow chart shown in FIG. 2, heretofore the usual method of reading Class 2 (or Class 1) two-way MIUs was for the DCU to determine if there were any MIUs waiting to be read as shown at 102. If any MIUs needed reading, and if no other MIUs were requesting service, i.e., load survey, tamper reporting, etc., then the DCU would send a request to the next MIU scheduled to be read (block 104), and it would await the response from that MIU, and it would process the response (block 106). If there was an MIU which was requesting service (block 108), then that MIU's request would be processed (block 110) prior to continuing with the reading of unread MIUs.

With reference to the timing diagram of FIG. 4, in the meter reading cycle of the prior art, the DCU transmitted a request (at 120) to MIU.sub.1 to send its reading to the DCU. Next MIU.sub.1 sent its reading to the DCU (at 122), and then the DCU sent an acknowledgment signal to MIU.sub.1 (at 124), thereby completing he request/answer sequence for MIU.sub.1. Thereafter, the DCU performed the same sequence with MIU.sub.2 (at 126, 128, 130), MIU.sub.3, etc.

Referring to the Table in FIG. 3, if it takes a certain amount of time, .tau..sub.ra, for a DCU to make a request of each MIU in its cell for a reading, for the selected MIU to answer the requesting DCU, and for the DCU to acknowledge the response of the MIU, then the number of readings per month will be limited. By way of example, for a .tau..sub.ra of 405 minliseconds (ms), 2.469 MIUs can be read per second. As there is a statistical probability that any given read might not be successful, FIG. 3 assumes a 90% success rate for each reading attempt, which brings the effective MIU read rate down to 2.222 reads per second. Given that there are 2,000,000 MIUs in the territory, and assuming that there is an 85% reliability rate on readings, then there are 5,760,000 reading periods available for all purposes. However, if each MIU must be read once per month, simply to perform monthly billings, then 2,000,000 of the available readings are already used for billing (AMR) purposes alone, leaving only 3,760,000 time slots available for all other purposes. Thus, if load survey was desired, with each MIU involved in load survey to be accessed once every 15 minutes during the month, only about 1,300 MIUs could be involved in load survey out of the 2,000,000 MIUs in the territory. As will be recognized by those skilled in the art, this means that only about 0.065% of the MIUs in the territory could be involved in load surveys--a very small number given the cost of a fixed network system.

Another way of looking at it is that 34.7% of the available meter readings in a given month (30 days) are used solely to read each meter for billing purposes alone. That means that more than 10 days per month will be occupied to simply perform meter reading for billing purposes.

From the foregoing analysis, it was determined that while Class 1 and Class 2 systems provide the capability of supporting a "request-answer" form of communications, the time required to perform such communications is simply too great for a large scale deployment of MIUs to operate in a satisfactory manner. Yet, absent the capability for a large scale deployment, the cost of a fixed network system could be hard to justify.

With reference to FIG. 5, in accordance with the present invention, rather than using an individual "request-answer" system to perform MIU readings, each MIU in each cell is assigned a unique time displacement number, n.sub.i. Each of the MIUs in each cell is programmed to receive a single, general meter reading request from the cell's DCU. Then, based upon the time it takes for a single MIU to send its normal reply, and allowing for some additional "guard time", for a total time of .tau..sub.res per MIU, each MIU will respond in turn to a DCU meter reading request by waiting for n.sub.i *.tau. seconds, and then sending in its meter reading. As will be obvious to those skilled in the art, the use of this technique means that if each meter reading request of the prior art took (approximately) .tau..sub.ra seconds (bearing in mind, that each prior art meter reading request had to uniquely identify the specific MIU being queried, and to acknowledge the MIU, whereas the general meter reading request of the present invention is simply a request for all meters in the cell to reply (in a predetermined order) with their respective meter identifications and readings), then the amount of time required to read all N of the MIUs in any cell would go from (approximately) N*.tau..sub.ra to approximately (N+1)*.tau..sub.res (allowing for .tau..sub.res as the time for the DCU to make their general request). As .tau..sub.res is typically less than one-half .tau..sub.ra, a substantial amount of time can be saved using the present invention. More importantly, however, is the fact that the DCUs in each of the cells, including adjacent cells, could be programmed to each make its general request for readings at either the same time, or, alternatively, they may be sequenced so that each DCU makes its request serially before any of the MIUs begins to answer the requests. This would entail a very short wait by the first MIU in the first cell to receive the general call for a reading (i.e., on the order of 19*.tau..sub.res) with a shorter wait on the part of the first MIU in each succeeding cell. Consequently, there will be no DCU/DCU interference as all of the DCUs would be broadcasting the same message at the same time, or, alternatively, when no other DCU or MIU is transmitting. Further, there would be no other interference, as the MIUs broadcast with lower power than the DCUs. Thus, a very important feature of the present invention is that even though only a single channel is used, adjacent cell interference is substantially eliminated, due to the extremely limited number of times that a DCU must transmit, thereby allowing not only for greater throughput on a per cell basis, but also on a per system (territory) basis.

Referring now to FIG. 6, if .tau..sub.res is approximately 210 ms (i.e., the one-way time for each MIU in a cell to respond to a general DCU reading request), and allowing an additional 125 ms slot per MIU reading for outage detection readings ("ODR"), tamper-detection readings ("TDR"), and DCU processing of responses, there would be a net reading rate of about 2.985 reads per second. Consequently, it would take approximately 2,010 seconds (33.5 minutes) to read each of the 6,000 meters in a cell. Thus, even if a conservative reading failure rate of 30% was assumed, and an overall success rate greater than 99% was desired, it would be necessary to read each MIU seven times, i.e., 14,070 seconds (3.908 hours), to be assured of having properly read more than 99% of the MIUs in each cell.

Given the above assumptions, there would (on average) still be 1.312 unread MIUs per cell, or about 437.4 MIUs out of the total population of 2,000,000 MIUs which have not been read successfully. It is assumed that these MIUs could be read by the conventional "request-answer" mode described in FIGS. 2, 3, and 4, with a "request-answer" time period of about 405 ms (allowing for a 90% success rate). This additional two-way reading of the hard to read MIUs would add (for the entire 2,000,000 MIU population) only an additional 196.83 seconds (0.055 hours) per cycle. Thus, the entire MIU population could be read using the system of the present invention with a success rate greater than 99%, and the unread meters could be read using a normal two-way "request-answer" exchange in a little over 3 minutes for all of the cells. Note, that this extra time assumes that only one DCU is active at a time, notwithstanding that only 1 out of about 19 cells could possibly interfere with reasonably adjacent cells.

As will be obvious to those skilled in the art, as the present invention eliminates any potential for DCU/DCU interference, the number of cells in the system is no longer a relevant factor in determining the time to read all of the MIUs in a system. Consequently, a substantial amount of time will be available for other functions, such as load survey and on-demand reading. With reference to the Table in FIG. 7, it can be observed that by having a general "load survey" request which goes out to those MIUs which have been programmed to respond to such a request by sequentially sending out their load survey data, it is possible to have 1% of the MIUs in a cell respond to load survey requests every 15 minutes by using only about 15.85% of the time available per day.

Referring to FIGS. 6 and 7, it can be seen that by using the present inventive method, both AMR reading (3.963 hours/day) and load survey applications (3.804 hours/day) can be accomplished in 7.867 hours per day in a cell containing 6,000 MIUs. Thus, less than one-third of the time available needs to be spent performing both AMR and load survey applications, thereby leaving a substantial amount of time for other desired functions.

Referring now to FIGS. 8 and 9, the use of the present invention with a mix of Class 2 MIUs (25%) and Class 4 MIUs (75%) is shown. As indicated, the total time required to perform both AMR and load survey for 6,000 MIUs (1,500 Class 2 and 4,500 Class 4) would be only about 7.42 hours per day, leaving more than 61% of the day available for other functions.

Turning now to FIG. 10, a simple block diagram of an MIU 150 in accordance with the present invention, is shown. The MIU 150 is attached to a meter 170, which may be any type of utility meter (water, gas, electricity, or heat) which includes an appropriate pulser, encoder, tamper detection sensor, outage detection sensor, or other electronics, including registers, mass memory, etc.

The MIU includes a processor 158 which is typically a microprocessor, which is connected to RAM 160 and a read only memory, which may be comprised of the programmable read only memory 162. The RAM 160 may contain some non-volatile memory for storing parameters in the event of a power outage (i.e., meter readings, tamper detections, etc.). The processor controls, and communicates with, a receiver 154 and a transmitter 156. Both the receiver 154 and the transmitter 156 are connected to a suitable antenna 152, which may be either external or internal, or which may be formed as part of the circuit board on which the MIU's circuitry is mounted.

As explained above, the MIU 150 is either a Class 1 or Class 2 (two-way) MIU. Typically, the MIU 150 includes an identification number which is stored in a non-volatile memory, such as the PROM 162, which uniquely identifies the MIU 150 in the system. A DCU can communicate with the MIU 150 and based upon the software which is in the MIU's PROM 162, the MIU 150 can perform various functions, such as meter reading, load survey reporting, etc. Consistent with the present invention, a number, representative of the offset time which the MIU 150 should wait after receiving a general request for a meter reading from the MIU's cell's DCU prior to transmitting the reading of the meter 170, can be stored in the PROM 162, and changed as needed by the DCU. Similarly, other data, i.e., whether the MIU 150 is to be included in a load survey application, and, if so, how long it should wait after receiving a general command to transmit load survey data, can also be stored in the PROM 162.

As will be obvious those skilled in the art, numerous changes can be made to the MIU 150 without departing from the spirit or intended scope of the present invention, and the simplistic block diagram illustrated in FIG. 10 was meant only to show one possible method of building an MIU 150 having the minimum functionality required by the present invention.

By way of example, the MIU 150 is shown to include a receiver 154. While a Class 3 MIU also includes a receiver, the receiver in a Class 3 MIU is not adapted to be able to download a number representative of the time delay for a Class 3 MIU to have to wait until transmitting a response to a DCU. Similarly, a Class 4 MIU contains no receiver. Consequently, for a Class 3 unit to be able to operate in accordance with the time delayed transmission of the present invention, it would have to be programmed either with a reader/programmer or by replacing its PROM 162. Alternatively, these units, operating in Class 3 and Class 4, are able to transmit randomly, as explained in conjunction with the discussion herein relating to FIG. 9.

As will be apparent to those skilled in the art, numerous other changes can be made without departing from the spirit or intended scope of the present invention.