SCADA System for Online Electrical Engineering Education

Abstract

Renewable energy sources are increasingly being integrated into small-scale production systems, so plants with multiple supply sources are becoming more common. This improvement in technology added to a greater social awareness of energy saving and resource usage, which makes flexible systems to manage these facilities necessary. Modern energy management can be more accessible to the interested public if it is located in universities, making it available to teachers and students alike. Furthermore, as it is a developing field of study, its location on campus facilitates research, maintenance, and financing. In this scenario, a SCADA system is proposed, capable of monitoring and centrally storing the values of the most important production and consumption parameters. In addition, by using this system, it is possible to control the state of the different energy sources in a centralized way, as well as their distribution in the plant where it is implemented. This study focuses on the management of a flexible, modern, and accessible solution to the advances in electrical systems because of technological development in this field, which broadens the experience of university teachers and students in their engineering careers. The systems have been put into practice in the facilities of a research and teaching laboratory at the University of Almeria, which integrates renewable and conventional energy resources.