Demand Side Management System Characterization for Residential Users in Manizales City

Abstract

This paper presents the characterization of Demand Side Management System with three constitutive subsystems: i) graphic operation and control interface, ii) communications network through narrow-band power lines (NB-PLC) according to G3-PLC standard, and iii) an array of six photovoltaic solar panels. The LabView graphical interface simulates the system operator and contains the management system control program. The photovoltaic solar generation system was implemented in Manizales city, allowing energy contribution analysis of photovoltaic array with centralized inverter or with microinverters over an 11 months period. Communications system quality tests are presented reaching a Data Transfer Rate of 0.2702 KB/s for a 20.44 meters distance between nodes. Additionally, it is observed that, despite the high levels of precipitation and cloudiness of Manizales city, photovoltaic array with microinverters got a 16.5% gain of generated energy over the energy generated by photovoltaic array with centralized inverter.