Automated voltage regulating transformer with IOT based monitoring system

Project Title

Automated voltage regulating transformer with IOT based monitoring system

Project Area of Specialization Electrical/Electronic EngineeringProject Summary

Electricity is an essential utility used by mankind. The usage of electricity has been on the rise as the world moves towards a more digital outlook. Pakistan also follows this trend and the need to have a continuous, reliable and stable electric flow is a priority for our country progress. However upon closer inspection of the supply of electricity we identified a common problem related to voltage regulation in power distribution system. The voltage supplied to consumer is not constant but can vary from 80V to 300V at any given instance. This is very dangerous for all electrical appliances, as such large variations in electricity can lead to appliance being damaged. The common solution is to purchase voltage stabilizer and dedicate a stabilizer with each appliance however this is costly and takes a lot of space. Our project aims to provide an easy to apply solution to this problem. We aim to incorporate voltage regulation in distribution transformers thereby eliminating the need to have voltage stabilizers plus ensuring a constant and fixed electricity supply to consumer. We will implement a multiwinding transformer on the secondary side and through them ensure a constant supply of voltage to consumer. Additionally we will incorporate IoT based monitoring of transformer so that both consumer and distributor can get real time information on transformer performance and reliability. Our monitoring system will enable distributors to predict any fault that can potentially arise in transformer through real time data provided by monitoring system on a website. Through our project we will ensure appliance safety through voltage regulation in the transformer and provide both user and distributor with economic benefits through our monitoring system.

Project Objectives

Usually, output voltage from the transformer is not smooth and consumers have to use stabilizers with their appliances to protect them from high voltages and similar arrangements are followed in industries to protect the load. Also conventional monitoring of transformers through humans or SCADA is costly, time consuming and inefficient hence this requires some modern set up for their continuous remote monitoring. This project is aimed to design an AVR transformer that will provide regulated voltage at its output with the help of relays and will prevent irregular voltage to reach the loads. A system will be designed to continuously send transformer parameter’s data to the grid station through internet service so that worker can get continuous update about transformer’s health. We will be using sensors to read transformer’s data and using Arduino this data will be uploaded on web cloud through ThingSpeak platform. Different parameters of transformer like humidity, temperature and voltage would be remotely monitored in real time and action could be taken accordingly in a prototype system. By designing a real time automatic voltage regulating transformer and monitoring system for it we will increase reliability, efficiency and cost effectiveness of power distribution system.

Core objectives:

• Incorporate voltage regulation in transformer to provide constant & fixed voltage to consumers
• Provide continuous data of transformer parameters remotely
• Provide economical and health benefits for electricity consumers
•  Provide economical and time benefits for utility system
• Eradicate cost of stabilizers 

• Continuous and safe supply of electricity

• Increase efficiency and reliability of power utility
• Get early transformer fault prediction and ultimately increase life of transformer 

Project Implementation Method

Our project has two major objectives and to fulfill those objectives we have performed different steps.

• Automatic Voltage Regulating Transformer (AVR) simulation
• Temperature and humidity sensor’s hardware
• Sending DHT22 sensor’s data to ThingSpeak
• Transformer interfacing with Arduino and voltage sensor
• Sending voltage sensor’s data to ThingSpeak

AVR simulation:

For hardware, we are intended to use servo motor and brushes for changing transformer’s tap but as we are using Proteus version 8 for the simulation and here we cannot connect brushes to transformer winding with servo motor. So, we used multi-tap transformer with relays for tap changing. For different levels of voltage specific relay is turned ON or OFF to get a regulated voltage at output.

                       

                                                                

We have used software for simulation:

• Arduino IDE
• Proteus

Mathematical modeling:

As                                                 

                                                  N1N22=L1L2    and        N1N2=v1v2

                                   

For relay 1 which has to operate from 200v to 210v:

                                                                               V1V22=L1L2

                        2052202=1HL1

                    L2= 1.151 H

For relay 2 which has to operate from 210v to 220v:

                  L3= 1.047 H

For relay 3 which has to operate from 220v to 230v:

                   L4= 0.956 H

For relay 4 which has to operate from 230v to 240v:

                    L5= 0.876 H

Sensor's interfacing with Arduino:

• DHT22 and Arduino interfacing
• ZMPT101B and Arduino interfacing
• ESP8266 module and Arduino interfacing

Complete Circuit Diagram:

         Monitoring circuit diagram

Sending data from sensors to cloud:

Sensors are very cheap but have hight performance as well. We have used DHT22 and ZMPT101B sensors to transmit temperature, humidity and voltage values to thingspeak respectively. To read data from sensor we have included the following libraries to arduino.

We got the exact values of temperature, humidity and voltage by reading values through these fuctions.

We have created an account on thingspeak and a channel with three fields to display three different parameters data. We can create as many channels as we want and maximum of 8 fields can be added to one channel. We got 16 digit API key from thingspeak account for appropriat read and write privately. It requires our WiFi connection’s SSID and password to establish connection with Thingspeak.

In arduino we have declared three fields and these fields are defined for specific data group.

Benefits of the Project

• No need of stabilizers with any appliance
• Continuous regulated supply at consumer end
• Remote information about transformer’s health
• One product will solve two major problems:
  • voltage regulation through AVR 
  • Transformer monitoring through monitoring system integrated with AVR 
• Continuous and safe supply of electricity
• No need of special training for customers/grid employees to use it 

Technical Details of Final Deliverable

Project deliverables:

Our proposed system mainly comprises of following features:

• Differential protection and tap changing AVR
• Transformer’s parameters monitoring
• Data reception and alert 

The developed system in this project consists of an Automatic Voltage Regulating (AVR) Transformer which will output voltage in limited range with help of multiple relays connected to the terminals of secondary winding. In this way, regulated voltage will reach the load and load will be safe from sudden high voltage spikes. Objective of designing such transformer is to increase the protection and reliability of appliances and utility system and to decrease the high cost used in voltage stabilizers and industrial protection circuits.

Different sensors and modules fabricated on PCB will be used to measure different transformer parameters and they will be connected to Wi-Fi service through microcontroller for continuous data transmission to grid station. Whenever voltage level goes above or below the reference voltage microcontroller will generate a signal to change its tap as required.

Data acquisition will provide data about transformer’s real time situation or voltage level. So the sensors will obtain continuous data of respective parameters and send it to microcontroller which is programmed to exchange data with web server.

Our project will comprise of PCB having sensors, microcontroller and Wi-Fi module that will be connected to transformer and an AVR transformer that will change its tap automatically according to voltage level. All the hardware will be tested on our own made AVR transformer.

Final Deliverable of the Project HW/SW integrated systemCore Industry Energy Other Industries Others Core Technology Internet of Things (IoT)Other Technologies OthersSustainable Development Goals Affordable and Clean Energy, Responsible Consumption and ProductionRequired Resources

Item Name	Type	No. of Units	Per Unit Cost (in Rs)	Total (in Rs)
			Total in (Rs)	25000
AVR transformer	Equipment	1	10000	10000
ZMPT101B sensor	Equipment	2	750	1500
Relay	Equipment	6	300	1800
Arduino UNO	Equipment	2	1500	3000
DHT22 sensor	Equipment	1	700	700
ESP8266 module	Equipment	1	300	300
servo motor	Equipment	1	700	700
miscellaneous	Miscellaneous	1	7000	7000