Performance of Cognitive Smart Grid Communication in Home Area Network

Spectrum measurement has been conducted in different areas and it is reported that the spectrum utilization efficiency is poor. To improve the spectrum utilization efficiency, cognitive radio concept is deployed. Using cognitive radio ability, cognitive users sense the spectrum bands and utilize idle channels opportunistically. The main constraint is that no harmful interference should be incurred to licensed users. One of the applications of cognitive radio is smart grid communication. Smart grid is an intelligent electricity grid system which is more resilient, robust, and secure. To ensure stability in smart grid, dual-way communication is the key role. In cognitive smart grid framework, smart grid devices utilize idle channels to transmit data. In this paper, cognitive radio is applied in Industrial, Science, and Medical (ISM) bands for smart grid home area network. Cognitive radio aims to improve the performance of sensing multiple channels and to mitigate noisy channels in ISM bands. Simulation has been carried out by using NS-2. The simulation result shows that the performance of cognitive smart grid outperforms conventional 802.11 in term of delay and spectral efficiency.