Welcome to the first part of the first interview of Smart Talks season 4!
Our guest was Klemen Belec, DLMS UA Chair of the Technical Board and Electrical Energy Smart Meter Sub Working Group, former Head of Marketing and Member of the Board at IDIS association and Head of the Techno-Commercial team at Iskraemeco. We discussed the future of DLMS, covered standards in the multi-utility area, and discussed the steps needed for further legislation and regulation in the field of multi-utility.
What are your personal experiences in implementing Multi-utility so far? Can you tell us a little more about work in general and work related to Multi-utility in that area?
I started my work in the Energy segment with software solutions for DSOs, but it’s been five years since I joined Iskraemeco and started working closer with metering. Since the beginning, it was clear that if utilities are to have multiple options from different vendors and if we want to have interoperability assured, then we need some standards to rely on. Fortunately we had DLMS and IDIS in past to cover this.
In my opinion, what was made in DLMS is very important. DLMS offers a full suite, specification harmonised in IEC and CENELEC standards and on top of this testing and certification of the devices. Without certification, we can never be sure of the compliance and compatibility of the device, whether the meter is implemented within the standard or if interoperability exists.
At first, IDIS covered the whole electricity meter interoperability process, then moved into multi-utilities, water, gas, etc. Are there any standards, and are you satisfied with the standards in the area of Multi-utility? How do you see the further development of standards in this area?
I wasn’t in the IDIS association from the beginning and IDIS would now be almost 15 years old. But it has been merged into DLMS recently, so everything related to conformance and compatibility is now built within DLMS. It has been clear for some time that residential users don’t only have smart electricity meters. They already have other smart appliances like water, electricity, gas, meters, etc. It makes a lot of sense to aggregate all of them and use a single communication path to transfer the data to the network operation center.
The smart electricity meter is one step ahead if you compare them with water or gas meters due to its complexity and dealing with a lot of data. Another significant advantage is that it is under a permanent power supply.
Regarding standardization, on the electrical side, we have DLMS, who is preparing the specification and harmonizing it with the help of IEC and CENELEC at standardization bodies, and offering a place for testing and certifications.
As for wired and wireless MBus, which is most often used for communication between the gas or water meter, we’re also standardizing DLMS Multi-utility interface, which is part of the meter compatibility tests if this option is supported in the device.
I hope that DLMS and OMS can upgrade the level of cooperation even more and prepare grounds for certification of this whole section.
The latest IDIS package is the 3.2, and the next profile specification will be the new DLMS profile for electricity called ACESM profile. The first package published by DLMS will be called Alternating Current Electricity Smart Metering Profile.
We’re also planning to have the DC electricity profile and a Multi-utility profile specification covered soon.
DLMS has focused in past mostly on profiles for the smart electrical meters, with the options for submetering to connect and transfer the data of water and gas meters to the data center. However, now, DLMS has started activities to define DLMS-owned profiles for those other meters as well.
Does that mean you’ll provide tests and certifications for them as well?
Yes. All DLMS profiles will have tests and certifications.
The new electricity DLMS profile should be out by the end of this year, with tests and certifications.
We are planning those related to water and gas, and others will follow soon. The new multi-utility profile will be created as a standalone profile and should be available by the end of this year.
Are there any established legislation and regulation in the Multi-utility field?
We’re yet to see.
I don’t think the multi-utility profiles are completed, and there will certainly be new functionality added to profiles. The whole situation is very dynamic. The great thing about the Multi-utility and all the rest of DLMS profiles is that they are communication agnostic. 5G is bringing new communication technologies but the profile above them will stay there assuring application level of interoperability of the device.
DLMS and OMS are working on standardization. Are there any others?
What organizations should collaborate to further develop legislation and regulation in Multi-utility? With which organizations your organization cooperates regarding this?
As for cooperation, I believe DLMS should open itself up to others while working on its development. We will see which organizations could be a good match for collaboration.
It would be challenging, if not impossible, to do everything alone. DLMS collaborates with other organizations and associations as that seems to be the best option for everyone and the best outcome for the future.
Conclusion:
It is essential to round off the entire process of Multi-utility standardization in terms of adopting standards, but also to enable testing and certification.
Until now, no standard for multi-utility has stood out and established itself. Standards are evolving, new functionalities are being added to profiles for those devices, and it’s a dynamic, ongoing process. DLMS and OMS have already created a standard for reading MBus devices. Still, they should continue to cooperate to further improve and standardize the specification and to enable testing and certification.
DLMS had so far defined the profile for Multi-utility devices as an add-on option of the electricity meter profile because the focus was on profiling electricity meters. The electricity meter was used for water, gas and heat meters reading. The DLMS will create separate profiles for water, gas and heat meters in their specification so these devices could be read independently of electricity.
Question for the audience
In your opinion, would Multi-utility devices be read using an electricity meter or independently?