Smart Grid Critical Traffic Routing and Link Scheduling in 5G IAB Networks

The increased integration of distributed energy resources (DERs) results in a two-way dynamic operation of the power distribution grid. Consequently, conventional Protection, Automation, and Control (PAC) systems are not able to manage DER related constraints in the distribution grid. New Fault location, Isolation, and service Recovery (FLISR) schemes based on communication capabilities are gaining a lot of momentum. Together with the 5th generation of mobile networks (5G), they improve the reactivity and the coordination of the grid defense lines. In this context, we present in this paper a FLISR traffic management framework in 5G Integrated Access and Backhaul (IAB) networks. Our framework consists first in optimizing the placement of FLISR protection functions within the Radio Access Network (RAN). Then, a joint routing and link scheduling of FLISR traffic in the 5G-RAN is proposed by taking into account the energy consumption. To achieve this, we formulate the master problem as two correlated integer linear programs (ILP) and present an optimal solution to solve it. Our objective is to find the best trade-off between the achieved network throughput and energy consumption, while ensuring the latency constraint of FLISR traffic. Our approach is compliant with the Software-Defined Radio Access Network (SD-RAN) paradigm since it can be integrated as a control flow application on top of a SD-RAN controller. Through a case study, we show that our proposed approach achieves significant gains in terms of energy consumption, flow acceptance and achieved network throughput, compared to baseline routing and placement strategies.