MONICA: Advanced Monitoring and Control in MV and LV Distribution Network

Abstract

The MONICA Project is an innovation experience focused on the monitoring and control of the distribution networks of the future, where smart agents such as Distributed Energy Resources, electric vehicles or active end users play a key role. A deployment of sensors have been completed on the Smartcity Málaga Living Lab, involving fifty-nine Secondary Substations and more than nineteen thousand real end users, all of them equipped with smart meters. The core of the MONICA Project is the State Estimator, a disruptive series of algorithms scarcely used until now in medium and low voltage networks in normal operation conditions. This tool determines the operating conditions of the whole network, in the presence of sensors or not, letting the Distribution System Operator apply active strategies to fight against energy losses and to optimize operation and maintenance.