What kind of sparks will be created when 5G meets the power grid?

In the past, electricity changed the way of production and living of human society. In the future, 5G will promote a new digital production and lifestyle of human society. So what kind of "sparks" will be created when these two super infrastructures, 5G and power grid, meet at the intersection of the new era?

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On the 40th anniversary of the establishment of Shenzhen Special Economic Zone, the "Light Up Shenzhen, 5G Smart City" themed conference was officially launched at the Shangri-La Hotel, Futian, Shenzhen on August 17. At the conference, Xie Hong, deputy general manager of Shenzhen Power Supply Bureau of China Southern Power Grid, gave a speech on "5G + full stack localization + smart grid to help build a 5G smart city", sharing the practical results of the integrated development of 5G, AI, cloud and smart grid, as well as the measures taken by the power grid industry to promote 5G deployment.

Assisting the "5G Smart City" and taking the lead in building a 5G smart grid

Shenzhen Power Supply Bureau is committed to providing high-quality power supply services for Shenzhen's socialist demonstration zone with Chinese characteristics and the core cities of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, and always keeps up with the development pulse of the special zone. With the advent of the 5G era, the deep integration of 5G, cloud, AI and other technologies will accelerate the upgrading of smart cities and bring new opportunities for urban development and economic transformation. Facing the 5G digital economy era, the Shenzhen Municipal Government has introduced a series of fruitful incentive policies for 5G construction and AI and cloud ecosystem construction, and is making every effort to lay 5G highways and build smart cities in all aspects.

Stable and efficient power supply has always been a key factor in supporting social and economic development. Shenzhen Power Supply Bureau actively integrated into and served the construction of the "Dual Zones", and developed the Shenzhen power grid from a fishing village power grid with a load of only 7,600 kilowatts in 1979 to a modern urban power grid with a capacity of 19.13 million kilowatts, pushing Shenzhen from one of the most severely power-deficient areas in the country to gradually developing into a city with the highest power supply load density and leading power supply reliability in the country. In 2019, the Shenzhen power grid reduced the average power outage time of customers to 32.4 minutes per household, which is better than international first-class cities such as London. The Futian Central District is only 0.19 minutes per household, reaching the world's top level.

Looking to the future, with the development of Shenzhen's smart city, higher requirements are placed on the security, reliability, and operational efficiency of smart grids. To this end, under the guidance of the State Grid Corporation of China, the Shenzhen Power Supply Bureau took the lead and began researching 5G+ smart grid applications as early as the end of 2017. In 2020, it was selected as the only national new infrastructure key project in Shenzhen, and 5G-scale commercial use was carried out in Shenzhen.

Looking back on the Shenzhen Power Supply Bureau's exploration and practice of 5G smart grid, on July 11, 2017, Shenzhen Power Supply Bureau undertook the first 5G pilot project approved by the National Development and Reform Commission. In June 2018, it participated in the release of the world's first 5G smart grid white paper. In November 2018, it established an ICT joint laboratory with Huawei. In June 2019, based on 5G network capabilities and the world's first 5G timing terminal, it completed the world's first distribution network differential protection pilot verification in Bantian; in March 2020, it deployed the first 5G base station of the State Grid Corporation of China at the Pengcheng Substation to realize the access of the inspection robot business; in June 2020, it realized the online monitoring of transmission cables with 5G+ smart cameras on Qiaoxiang Road.

5G+ full-stack localization empowers smart grid

The power grid mainly includes transmission, substation, and distribution. Electricity comes out of the power plant, first goes through substation to boost the voltage, enters the high-voltage transmission line, then goes through substation to reduce the voltage, and then distributes it to each user. For the entire power grid, safety and reliability are the first requirements. For digital and intelligent applications in different links, the network requirements are different. For example, the distribution link has extremely high requirements for network latency and reliability, and the robot inspection application in the substation and transmission links has high requirements for network bandwidth. At the same time, due to the large coverage area of ​​the power grid, a wide coverage network is also required.

5G wireless networks with large bandwidth, low latency and wide coverage are more flexible and convenient than fiber deployment. They can also provide customized "industry-specific networks" for the power industry through high isolation, high security and SLA-guaranteed end-to-end network slicing, which is more reliable and secure than the "best effort" and "one-size-fits-all" 4G networks. Therefore, 5G can better match the needs of smart grids, better enable grid networking and digitization, and integrate with AI, cloud and other technologies to promote safer, more reliable, flexible and efficient smart grid upgrades.

To support the deep integration of 5G and power grid services, Shenzhen Power Supply Bureau has built a 5G power communication network, using intelligent equipment such as 5G cameras, 5G robots, 5G smart gateways, and based on a full-stack domestic data center, it has created a 5G smart grid application scenario covering the transmission, transformation and distribution links.

Safe and efficient power transmission

Shenzhen Power Supply Bureau pioneered the combination of 5G cameras and multifunctional smart poles in the national power industry, and realized intelligent monitoring of construction conditions along and around high-voltage cable channels through artificial intelligence algorithms. In addition, Shenzhen Power Supply Bureau has installed 1,812 sets of intelligent AI cameras on transmission lines to achieve full coverage of Shenzhen power grid transmission lines. Taking the inspection of a 500 kV transmission line as an example, the traditional manual inspection requires 2 people to inspect for 10 days, but now it can be completed in 2 hours through the new generation of transmission intelligent inspection system.

Smart and interconnected substation

Shenzhen Power Supply Bureau has completed the construction of its first 5G smart substation, Pengcheng Substation. It uses a self-developed intelligent operation support platform to transmit high-definition data from smart cameras in real time through the 5G large-bandwidth, low-latency network, and remotely and accurately control on-site robots in real time, thereby supporting the unmanned and intelligent operation of daily operations such as substation inspections and operations, and increasing inspection efficiency by 2.7 times.

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(5G inspection robot)

Flexible and reliable power distribution

When a power grid line fails, distribution network differential protection can quickly isolate and restore the fault point, minimizing the power outage time and the area affected by the power outage. Distribution network differential protection is a key technology to ensure the stable operation of the power grid. It has extremely high requirements on network capabilities, requiring the transmission delay of the communication network to be in the millisecond level and the timing accuracy to be within the microsecond level.

(5G wireless communication differential protection cabinet)

In order to verify the supporting role of 5G for distribution network differential protection, Shenzhen Power Supply Bureau and Huawei jointly completed the world's first 5G SA network cross-base station differential protection test with services, successfully verifying that 5G can meet the millisecond-level low latency and microsecond-level high-precision network timing requirements of power grid control services, reaching the international leading level, and 6 technical achievements are the first in the world.

5G's low latency and high reliability characteristics have broken the limitations of 4G and optical fiber, effectively carrying the technical requirements of distribution network differential protection, upgrading the fault isolation time from seconds to milliseconds, significantly reducing the distribution network fault power supply recovery time, truly achieving "zero perception" of power outages, and meeting the needs of social and economic development for smart grids.

Autonomous and controllable full-stack domestic IT infrastructure

Shenzhen Power Supply Bureau was the first in the industry to carry out research on independent and controllable full-stack domestic architecture, introducing full-stack domestic IT infrastructure such as domestic Taishan servers, domestic Kunpeng processors, domestic openEuler operating systems, and domestic GaussDB databases, achieving a 100% localization rate for core components of systems such as smart power transmission, breaking the past situation of relying on foreign products, eliminating security backdoor hazards and power outage risks, and effectively ensuring power business and data security.

Sharing and win-win promote efficient deployment of 5G

5G network is the "digital highway" leading to the future intelligent society, but to build this road well, a large number of 5G base stations, edge nodes and other infrastructure need to be built. Shenzhen Power Supply Bureau actively responds to the national "new infrastructure" construction requirements, actively assumes social responsibilities, and gives full play to the advantages of substations, distribution rooms, power towers and cable corridors, etc., to help Shenzhen's 5G construction achieve "more, faster, better and cheaper".

Shenzhen Power Supply Bureau has more than 8,000 power towers, which have the advantages of wide coverage, easy power supply, and sufficient space on the towers, and are ready-made 5G base station site resources. Shenzhen Power Supply Bureau also has 261 substations and more than 15,000 distribution rooms, which have the advantages of sufficient site space, stable power supply, and proximity to users, and are suitable ICT room resources.

In order to efficiently integrate resources, Shenzhen Power Supply Bureau also seeks industrial cooperation with municipal resources, telecom operators, and equipment manufacturers to build multifunctional integrated sites such as 5G base stations, energy storage stations, smart distribution rooms, MEC, and Beidou ground-based augmentation stations, as well as multifunctional smart poles that integrate 5G base stations, power grid cameras, public security cameras, etc., in order to innovate operating models, expand new business forms, and achieve optimal resource allocation and shared win-win results.

At present, Shenzhen has achieved full 5G coverage, with 45,000 base stations, ranking first in the country in terms of construction density. Faced with the increasing demand for 5G electricity, Shenzhen Power Supply Bureau actively implemented Shenzhen's strategy of building a new smart city, and set up a 5G power supply service working group. Through on-site investigations, the establishment of green channel optimization processes, and the implementation of measures such as the conversion of 5G base station power supply to direct power supply, it has made every effort to ensure the power supply of 5G base stations, saving 5G operators about 100 million yuan in annual electricity costs.

At the end of his speech, Deputy General Manager Xie Hong stated that Shenzhen Power Supply Bureau will continue to implement the national new infrastructure development strategy, use new-generation digital technologies such as 5G to promote digital transformation, build a safe, reliable, green and efficient smart grid, and provide high-quality power supply and energy security for the development of the 5G industry. We will work closely with the 5G industry chain to accelerate the upgrade of smart cities and light up Shenzhen's 5G smart city.

In the past, electricity has entered thousands of households and industries, promoting the rapid development of social economy. In the future, 5G will also enter thousands of industries, empower the digital transformation of the whole society, and promote the rapid development of digital economy. Today, when the power grid meets 5G, the mutual integration and empowerment of the two will surely burst out brilliant sparks of wisdom and create greater value for the whole society.