Time Skew Mitigation in Smart Meters for Tampering Detection and Correction

Accurate estimation of nontechnical losses (NTL) requires the real-time data acquisition of different smart meters to be accurately synchronized at a common time reference. However, real-time data reported by smart meters are usually not accurately synchronized. This article proposes a new quantity, to be measured by the smart meters that will address the problem of time synchronization. The proposed measurement quantity is also utilized to propose a modified coding-based algorithm to detect and correct NTL in distribution systems. It is worth mentioning that the measurement of the proposed quantity does not require any additional hardware, and commercially available smart meters can be reprogrammed to perform the new functionality. The proposed algorithm along with the proposed measurement quantity is tested and compared to a benchmark coding-based algorithm. The proposed algorithm is shown to outperform the benchmark algorithm in practical scenarios.