System of monitoring, display and evaluation of energy consumption

Introduction

In the domestic area, the figure of the Smart Metering appears, which provides the user with more information and control over the use of electricity at home. The product Smart Metering developed provides the user with the ability to discover their consumption habits, offering a real reference to use as a starting point when developing strategies that make their consumption more efficient and therefore more respectful with the environment.

The system is based on two main parts: the Smart Meter and the Display App, which are connected through a remote portal where information is saved:

  • The Smart Meter, based on the hardware platform Arduino, is in charge of measuring the electric current by means of a non-invasive sensor, as well as the equivalences of the CO2 emissions, and carries out a periodic updated of the data to the server web. To that extent, it uses an Ethernet connection wired to a router with Internet access.
  • The Display App, developed in Android, offers a graphic and numeric representation of the data stored in the web, which can be accessed remotely from any place using and Smartphone.

 

Smart meter

Smart meter is based on Arduino, an open-source platform that provides flexible and easy-to-use hardware and software.

Following images show the smart meter in operation:

   

 

App

Monitoring devices do not have the capacity to store indefinitely all the information they generate, so the system sends the captured data to a data storage service located in the cloud and accessible through the Internet. As a web platform that offers data collection services oriented to the new vision of the “Internet of Things”, Cosm/Xively has been used.

The user accesses the information located in Cosm/Xively through a mobile device. The user can access detailed energy consumptions at any time and place and detect anomalies such as out-of-function computer equipment, unplanned consumption, etc. In addition, the application calculates, using as a reference the consumption of electricity, its equivalence in CO2 emitted to the atmosphere.

The application for mobile devices has been developed for  Android operating system. The following figures show the application interface through which the user can access the system functionality.

 

Video

Following videos show the performance of the smart meter (audio in Spanish).