Performance evaluation of modbus and DNP3 protocols in the communication network of a university campus microgrid

The advanced metering infrastructure (AMI) allows real-time monitoring and control in the distribution network. This infrastructure requires the installation of different technologies and communication protocols in the microgrid to exchange data. However, a performance evaluation is required to identify whether the network and communication protocol meet the AMI requirements. Therefore, this paper presents an evaluation of Modbus and DNP3 protocols encapsulated in TCP under Wi-Fi and Ethernet technologies applied to microgrids. For this purpose, an AMI infrastructure was designed and implemented on a university campus microgrid. Then, both protocols were modeled and implemented in the NS-2 simulator to perform various tests. Both protocols were evaluated with field and simulation tests in three scenarios: point-to-point wireless topology, point-to-point wired topology, and multipoint wireless topology. Protocols are evaluated with metrics such as delay and throughput and the results of field and simulation tests are compared. The results show that the simulations performed with the proposed models have a good approximation to those obtained with the field tests. Both protocols perform well for real-time monitoring of the university campus microgrid, although the time response shows that they are not suitable for protection applications. In addition, Modbus presents better performance than DNP3 when transmitting a small amount of information, but DNP3 is more robust and efficient when transmitting a large amount of information. The paper shows promising results for simulating other applications in smart grids. • Simulations with new Modbus and DNP3 models approximate to field test. • Modbus and DNP3 are good for real-time monitoring of a university campus microgrid. • DNP3 behaves better than Modbus with large amount of information transmitted in the microgrid.