p 06378125 a cloud network-based power management

7/26/2019 P 06378125 a Cloud Network-based Power Management

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A Cloud Network-based Power Management

Technology for Smart Home Systems

Lih-Jen Kau†, member IEEE , Bi-Ling Dai, Chih-Shen Chen, and Sung-Hung Chen

Department of Electronic Engineering & Graduate Inst. of Computer and Communication Engr.National Taipei University of Technology

No.1, Sec. 3, Chung-Hsiao E. Rd.

Taipei 10608, Taiwan, R.O.C.

[email protected]

Abstract—With the fast development of network infrastruc-ture, connecting to the Internet at any time and any place hasbeen made easy and possible. On the other hand, as our worldis suffering energy crisis on oil and natural resources shortages,how to make ef cient use of limited power energy has remaineda major problem to be conquered so far. Aimed to facilitatethe life of human being as well as to use the limited powerenergy more ef ciently, we propose in this paper a technologythat can perform remote control and monitoring of electricalappliances on the Internet. To do this, an intelligent power socket(IPS) module that is able to control and monitoring the powerof electricity is realized in this research. The IPS modules areplaced in conjunction with the electrical appliances that are to becontrolled from a far-end place. In addition, an embedded system-based home gateway that can be connected with the Internet isset up in which the electrical appliances are located. Moreover,the acquired power consumption information or the status of theappliances is stored in a database server in the Cloud. With theproposed structure, authorized users or system managers canlog into the web server which is connected with the database,monitoring the power status and take actions on the appliancesremotely. The control command from the far-end place, i.e., fromthe web server on the Internet, is rst sent to the home gateway

and then transmitted to the IPS modules through the Zigbeewireless communication protocol so that the remote control of appliances can be achieved. The proposed architecture can beeasily applied to any kind of room space. Moreover, only abrowser is needed for the client to communicate with the webserver, no other application program is required. As the browseris now available almost on every information technology products,e.g., a notebook or a smart phone, the proposed architecture hasbeen shown to be very convenient and useful for remote controland monitoring of electrical appliances, and hence can facilitatethe life of human beings.

Index Terms—Cloud computing, Power management, Remotecontrol, Database, Client/Server Architecture, Embedded systems

I. INTRODUCTION

Our world is now suffering energy crisis on oil and natural

resources shortages. What’s worse is that most of the scientic

industries all over the world rely heavily on these resources,

especially the power energy. The high demands on power

energy do have a great impact on the economy of the world.

From the catastrophe of Japanese Tsunami in March 2011, we

are aware of the risks of nuclear power. Therefore, we realize

that the termination of nuclear power delivery is just a matter

of time. However, nuclear power cannot be replaced by Green

power in the near future yet. Therefore, while discovering a

substitution for nuclear power, we can now embark on energy

saving.

Considering our living environment, almost every place,

e.g., of ce, school, and dwelling house, are all equipped

with computers, air conditioners, lights and other high-power-

consumption devices. People usually forgot turning off thepower devices after they are not in use. Therefore, how to

make ef cient use of the limited energy resources so that

wasting of power energy can be avoided has become a major

problem to be conquered. Recently, the idea of central power

management system is proposed. However most of the central

power management system just perform on and off operation

on the power switch in a room space, control on every single or

individual appliance is hard to attained. In [1], a client/server-

based architecture in conjunction with bluetooth signal for

the remote control of home appliances is proposed. They

also propose the use of a Hall current transducer for the

monitoring of the status of electrical appliances. However, only

on and off control can be attained, and a specic applicationprogram should be installed on both the client host and the

server so that the control command can be transmitted via

the Internet [1]. A smart home energy management system

(SHEM) based on personal area networks is proposed in [2][3].

The SHEM system, which provided with the context-aware

ability and applies the use of Zigbee signal for indoor wireless

transmission of commands, is a well designed architecture

for smart home systems. However, the SHEM system cannot

be controlled remotely, and the power measurement ability

is also not implemented [2][3]. To monitoring the power

consumption, some of the researches propose measuring the

power consumption in digital manners [4][5] or reading the

power consumption remotely [6] so that the human resources

of the power company originally arranged for recording the

power meter of individual customer can be saved. On the other

hand, the user can also know the status of individual electrical

appliance remotely.

Aimed to facilitate the life of human being as well as to

use the limited power energy more ef ciently, we propose

in this paper a technology that can perform remote control

and monitoring of electrical appliances on the Internet. To do

this, a module that is able to control the power of electricity

2012 IEEE International Conference on Systems, Man, and CyberneticsOctober 14-17, 2012, COEX, Seoul, Korea

978-1-4673-1714-6/12/$31.00 ©2012 IEEE 2527



is realized. We call this module an intelligent power socket

(IPS) in the proposed system. The IPS modules are placed

in conjunction with the electrical appliances that are to be

controlled from a far-end place on the Internet. To do this, an

embedded system-based home gateway that can be connected

with the Internet is set up in which the electrical appliances

are located. Besides, we also set up a web server and a

database server in the cloud. The database server is used

to record the status and power consumption of individualappliances. With the proposed architecture, authorized users

or the system manager can log into the web server which is

connected with the database, monitoring the status and take

actions on the home appliances remotely. The user command

from the far-end place, i.e., from the web server in the cloud,

is rst sent to the home gateway and then transmitted to

the IPS modules through Zigbee wireless communication so

that the remote control of the appliances can be achieved.

The proposed architecture can be easily applied to any kind

of room space. Moreover, no application program should be

installed in the proposed architecture, only a browser for the

client is needed. As the browser is now available almost in

any devices, e.g., a notebook or a smart phone. The proposedsystem architecture is hence very friendly and convenient to

users that also facilitates the life of mankind.

The rest of the paper is organized as follows. Section

II gives an overview on the proposed cloud network-based

power management system. The detailed remote power control

and measurement technologies are then introduced in section

III. The layout of the database and dened communication

protocols are addressed in section IV. The designed intelligent

power socket (IPS) module and experiments are given in

section V. Finally, a conclusion is given in section VI.

I I . OVERVIEW OF THE P ROPOSED S YSTEM

In this section, we give an overview on the proposed system

architecture. As can be seen in Fig. 1, the proposed architecture

is mainly composed of three blocks, the client, the cloud web

server and database server, and the room space in which the

electrical appliances are located.

Any devices equipped with a browser can be used as the

client device. The database server here is used to record the sta-

tus or power consumption of individual electrical appliances.

Here, we use MySQL, a powerful and free software, as our

database server. To bridge the user, i.e., the browser, and the

database server, a web server is required. We apply Apache,

a widely used, free, and stable software, as our web server.

The client can now communicate with the web server throughHTTP protocol, an application layer protocol which is based

on TCP/IP protocol in the Internet hierarchy, monitoring the

status and take actions on individual appliance.

The control commands from the server in the Cloud are rst

sent to the home gateway through TCP/IP protocol and then

transmitted to the appliance with Zigbee wireless communica-

tion. The home gateway is a server which is used to receive

the user command from the far-end place on the Internet,

and to transmit the status as well as the power consumption

(a) (b)

Fig. 2. (a) The Cortex-M3-based RDK-S2e module. (b) The CC2530 Zigbeetransceiver.

information of appliances back to the database server. To

make the gateway compact, the RDK-S2e, a Cortex-M3-based

module developed by Texas Instruments incorporation (TI), is

chosen for this purpose (as shown in Fig. 2.(a)). Moreover,

the RDK-S2e module which transforms between UART and

TCP/IP protocol is very useful for industrial applications

for its compact dimension and robustness. The gateway will

then transmit the received commands to a Zigbee transceiver

through the universal asynchronous transmitter and receiver

(UART) interface.

The Zigbee protocol, which is based on the standard of

IEEE 802.15.4, has been widely applied in a variety of

elds for its characteristics of low-power consumption and

supporting variable topologies [2]-[13]. With these advantages,

the Zigbee is also selected for the short distance transmission

of signals in the proposed architecture. We choose in this

research the chip CC2530, a chip also developed by TI, as

the Zigbee transceiver (as shown in Fig. 2.(b)). The command

is then sent to another Zigbee receiver which is connected to

the appliance to be controlled in a wireless manner.

To summarize, the architecture of remote control process

can be best observed through Fig. 3, an architecture for smart

home systems. As can be seen in Fig. 3, the appliances areall integrated with the proposed IPS module so that the power

of individual appliances can be controlled remotely. The IPS

is also equipped with a Zigbee transceiver, which is used to

accept the command from the far-end as well as to transmit

the status of the appliance back to the server in the cloud.

III. POWER C ONTROL AND M EASUREMENT

The mechanism for power control and measurement will be

addressed in this section. We rst give a short introduction on

the basis of proposed power control mechanism. After that, the

IR remote control circuit as well as the power measurement

mechanism will be introduced.

A. The Power Control Unit

The basis of the power control mechanism is the zero-

crossing detection circuit, which is shown in Fig. 4. Point

A in Fig. 4 is a fully rectied waveform, where point B is

just an attenuated signal of A. After the inverter in Fig. 4,

the zero-crossing signals can be detected at point C, and the

zero-crossing signals can then be used for the control of power

electricity. In the proposed architecture, the point D is used to

control the duty cycle between on and off state of the solid

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Fig. 1. Proposed cloud-based remote power control and monitoring system.

Power Control &Measurement

RDK-S2eCC2530


Internet

ClientWeb-based Cont rol

and Surveillance

ZigBeewireless

transmission

UART

Home Gateway

Web Server &

Database Server


RDK-S2eCC2530


Internet

ClientWeb-based Cont rol

and Surveillance

ZigBeewireless

transmission

UART

Home Gateway

Web Server &

Database Server

Fig. 3. Proposed smart home systems.

state relay (SSR), which is indeed a pulse width modulation

system. The circuit in Fig. 4 constitutes the main portion of

the IPS module.

B. The IR Remote Control Unit

It is noted that some of the appliances, e.g., the air con-

ditioner, TV, etc, can not be controlled by varying the power

directly. For this, we design an IR transmission circuit as in

Fig. 5 that just acts what an IR remoter performs. The circuit

inside the dashed block in Fig. 5 is the sub-carrier generation

circuit (usually 38KHz) as well as the IR transmitter. As can

be seen in Fig. 5, the transmission of IR signal is controlled

by the CC2530 module.

VCC

+5V

D2+

C1

10uF/35V

R1- +

D1 1

2

3

4

U5

1

2

1 2

R2

S o l i d S t a t e R e l a y

U2

1 2 3 4

1 2 V +

V -

R3

1

3

2

U1

LM7805/TO

1

3

2VIN

G N D

VOUT

U6

AC Plug

1

2

AC1

AC2

+

C2

10uF/35V

U4

CC2530

Control PinIntr

T1TRANSFORMER

1 5

4 8

AC 11 0V IN A C 1 2 V

AC 11 0 V

A

B

C D

P o w e r S o c k e t

Fig. 4. Proposed power control mechanism.

C. The Power Measurement Unit

The block diagram of the power measurement circuit as

well as the detailed schematic diagram between the power

measurement module and the CC2530 Zigbee transmission

module are shown in Fig. 6 and Fig. 7 respectively. As can

be seen in Fig. 6 and Fig. 7, a small resistor is used in series

with the load to measure the current ow of the electricalappliance. The sensed current and voltage signal are then

amplied and processed through the chip ADE7753, a single-

phase multifunction metering IC. Besides, the instantaneous

current, voltage signal, the instantaneous power consumption,

active power, reactive power as well as the power factor

information (in Fig. 8) can all be calculated and kept in the

registers of ADE7753. We can then read all the values out by

connecting the serial SPI interface between the ADE7753 and

the CC2530 controller as in Fig. 6 and Fig. 7. The CC2530

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IR Transmission Module

VCC

Sub carrier Q1

C

BE

D1

IR Diode

C1

R5

R6

5

64

1

23

R1

R4

1

3

2

R3

R2

C C 2 5 3 0

C o n t r o lHome GatewayRDK-S2e

UART

Internet

TCP/IP

IR Transmission Module

VCC

Sub carrier Q1

C

BE

D1

IR Diode

C1

R5

R6

5

64

1

23

R1

R4

1

3

2

R3

R2

C C 2 5 3 0

C o n t r o lHome GatewayRDK-S2e

UART

Internet

TCP/IP

Fig. 5. IR transmission circuits.

Energ y

Measu rment

MCU

CC2530

Current

Voltage

ADC

ADC

P rogr ammable G ain Amplifier

SPI

ADE7753

AC 110/22 0V

Zigbeewireless

transmission

Energ y

Measu rment

Energ y

Measu rment

MCU

CC2530

MCU

CC2530

Current Current

VoltageVoltage

ADC

ADC

P rogr ammable G ain Amplifier

SPI

ADE7753

AC 110/22 0V

Zigbeewireless

transmission

Fig. 6. The block diagram of power measurement module.

controller can calculate the power energy used by summing up

the acquired instantaneous power consumption. These power

energy information will be transmitted to the home gateway via

the wireless Zigbee signal, and then sent back to the database

in the cloud (Fig. 3).

IV. DATABASE L AYOUT AND C OMMUNICATION

PROTOCOLS

In this section, the layout of the database server as well as

the command format, i.e., the communication protocol, are to

be introduced. We rst introduce the layout of the database,

and then the communication protocol will be given.

A. Database Layout

In the proposed architecture, we use MySQL, a very popular

and free database software, as our database server. In the

database, we have a main table that records the authorized

users and their password. Every registered user has an individ-

ual table that records the status of every electrical appliances.

The basic layout of the database server can be observed in

Fig. 9, which is the main page of PHPMyAdmin, a web-basedinterface that can manipulate the database server in a graphical

manner.

After connected and logged into the database server, the

authorized user will see the status of each electrical appliances

as in Fig. 10.(a). The user can then change to the command

mode as in Fig. 10.(b), which is actually a FORM component

in HTML document for interactive page design. The user can

then select the command or adjust the power of selected appli-

ance. After selecting the button Next , the control command will

CC2530

P0.5/MOSI

P0.4/ MIS O

P0.3/CLOCK

P0.2/CS

LOAD

SHUNT

CC2530

P0.5/MOSI

P0.4/ MIS O

P0.3/CLOCK

P0.2/CS

LOAD

SHUNT

Fig. 7. Schematic diagram of the power measurement module and connectionwith Zigbee transmission module.

Fig. 8. The measurement of power factor.

be sent out to the home gateway through the TCP/IP protocol

on the Internet.

The dynamic page on the web server is realized by using

the PHP language, a kind of script language embedded in the

HTML document. We thus transfer the control commands to

the home gateway by using the PHP socket after the user has

pressed the command button. The web server now acts justlike a client for the connection is initiated by the PHP socket.

The TCP/IP connection ow is shown in Fig. 11. The function

socket write() in Fig. 11 is to transmit the command to the

home gateway, while the function socket read() is to read the

status as well as the power consumption information of the

appliance. The read procedure is necessary because we have

to make sure that the commands or actions have been carried

out on the appliances to be controlled.

Fig. 9. The main page of PHPMyAdmin showing the layout of the databaseserver.

2530



(a) (b)

Fig. 10. (a) Status of appliances shown on the web server. (b) Webpageshowing the command mode.

socket_create()

socket_connect()

socket_write() socket_read()

Transmission

termination?

socket_close()

Yes

No No

Fig. 11. Connection process to the home gateway by using the PHP Socketon the web server.

B. Communication Protocols

In this subsection, we introduce three kinds of command

format used in the proposed architecture, i.e., the command

format for wired devices (Fig. 12), the command format for

devices controlled by IR remoter (Fig. 13), and that of the

acknowledgement from devices (Fig. 14).

The third byte in Fig. 12 is due to that we have three power

sockets in each IPS module. Therefore, we have to indicate

which number of the power socket is to be controlled. Indeed,

we have already registered the name of the device connected to

each power socket on the database before the control process.

In addition, the Module ID 0X 00 in the second byte of Fig.

13 is reserved for devices that have to be controlled by IRremoter. The third byte, i.e., Device Code, in Fig. 13 is to

select the device to be controlled, e.g., TV or air conditioner.

V. EXPERIMENTS

In this section, we show in Fig. 15.(a) the front view and

Fig. 15.(b) the side view of the designed IPS module. As can

be seen in Fig. 15, every IPS module has three power sockets,

and individual power socket is controlled by different SSR.

We also examine the proposed architecture by controlling the

Trailer

0X39

Func tion

CodeSoc k et IDModule ID

Leader

0X39

Fifth Byt eFour th Byt eThird ByteSecond ByteFirs t B yteCommand

f ormat f or

wired devices Trailer

0X39

Func tion

CodeSoc k et IDModule ID

Leader

0X39

Fifth Byt eFour th Byt eThird ByteSecond ByteFirs t B yteCommand

f ormat f or

wired devices

Fig. 12. Command format for wired devices.

Trailer

0X39

Ext ension

Func tion Code

Func tion

Code

Device

Code

Module ID

0x00

Leader

0X39

Si xth B yteFifth ByteFour th Byt eThird Byt eSecond Byt eFirs t Byt eCommand

f or Inf rared

DevicesTrailer

0X39

Ext ension

Func tion Code

Func tion

Code

Device

Code

Module ID

0x00

Leader

0X39

Si xth B yteFifth ByteFour th Byt eThird Byt eSecond Byt eFirs t Byt eCommand

f or Inf rared

Devices

Fig. 13. Command format for devices controlled by IR remoter.

power of a resistive device, i.e., a 60W tungsten lamp, in Fig.

16. We control the power of the tungsten lamp in a far-end

place on the Internet. Different power of the tungsten lamp,

i.e., power off, half power, and full power, can all be controlled

successfully as can be seen in Fig. 16.

VI . CONCLUSION

Aimed to facilitate the life of human beings as well as

to use the limited power energy more ef ciently, we propose

in this paper a technology that can perform remote control

and monitoring of electrical appliances on the Internet. Todo this, an intelligent power socket (IPS) module that is able

to control and monitoring the power of electricity has been

realized successfully in this research. The IPS modules are

placed in conjunction with the electrical appliances that are to

be controlled from a far-end place. In addition, an embedded

system-based home gateway that can be connected with the

Internet is set up in which the electrical appliances are located.

Moreover, the acquired power consumption information or the

status of the appliances are all stored in a database server in

the Cloud. With the proposed structure, authorized users or the

system manager can log into the web server which connected

with the database, monitoring the power status and take actions

on the appliances remotely. The control command from the

far-end place, i.e., from the web server on the Internet, is

rst sent to the home gateway and then transmitted to the IPS

Trailer

0x39Status CodeSoc k et IDModule ID

Leader

0x39

Fifth ByteFour th Byt eThird ByteSecond ByteFirs t Byt eCommand

f ormat

f or Ack Trailer

0x39Status CodeSoc k et IDModule ID

Leader

0x39

Fifth ByteFour th Byt eThird ByteSecond ByteFirs t Byt eCommand

f ormat

f or Ack

Fig. 14. Command format for acknowledgement from devices.

(a) (b)

Fig. 15. (a) Front view of the IPS with Zigbee transceiver. (b) Side view of the IPS with Zigbee transceiver.

2531



(a) The IPS with a tungsten lamp. (b) Power off status.

(c) Half power status. (d) Full power status.

Fig. 16. (a) The test platform, an IPS with a 60W tungsten lamp. (b)-(d) When the lamp is in off state, half power state, and full power state,respectively.

modules through the Zigbee wireless communication protocol

so that the remote control of appliances can be achieved.

The proposed architecture can be easily applied to any kind

of room space. Moreover, only a browser is needed for the

client to communicate with the web server, no other application

program is required. As the browser is now available almost

on every information technology products, e.g., a notebook or

a smart phone, the proposed architecture has been shown to

be very convenient and useful, and hence can facilitate the life

of human being.

ACKNOWLEDGMENT

The authors would like to thank the National Science

Council of Taiwan for nancial support of the research (under

Grant No. NSC 100-2221-E-027 -078).

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