Abstract
A smart grid is a next-generation power grid that can improve energy efficiency by applying information and communication technology to the general power grid. The smart grid makes it possible to exchange information about electricity production and consumption between electricity providers and consumers in real-time. Advanced metering infrastructure (AMI) is the core technology of the smart grid. The AMI provides two-way communication by installing a modem in an existing digital meter and typically include smart meters, data collection units, and meter data management systems. Because the AMI requires data collection units to control multiple smart meters, it is essential to ensure network availability under heavy network loads. If the load on the work done by the data collection unit is high, it is necessary to allocation new data collection units to ensure availability and improve energy efficiency. In this paper, we discuss the allocation scheme of data collection units for the energy efficiency of the AMI.