Interoperable and globally interconnected Smart Grid using IPv6 and 6LoWPAN

Abstract

The general feeling about ecology is changing worldwide. People all around the world are more careful about problems such as energy provisioning and consumption. New ideas, such as the Smart Grid concept, are trying to give solutions to the energy problems by means of a modern power grid with intelligent management capabilities. In such scenarios, networking solutions, e.g., the Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6), will allow appliances to be remotely coordinated in order to optimize the total power consumption, and balance the power demand. This paper presents an innovative implementation of the IPv6 stack over the 6LoWPAN adaptation layer. Our 6LoWPAN implementation aims to provide a support platform for IPv6 over interoperable constrained-resources devices, such as those embedded in the electrical appliances. Our main goals are to optimize the memory management and to address the portability problems of the stack. In particular we want to develop a stack which is not tied to a particular data-link protocol. Comparison with existing solutions is also provided.