DESC:TECHNICAL FIELD

[0001] The present disclosure relates to the field of circuit breakers. More particularly, the present disclosure relates to remote monitoring and status acknowledgement of circuit breakers using I2C (Inter-IC) bus.

BACKGROUND
[0002] Background description includes information that may be useful in understanding the present invention. It is not an admission that any of the information provided herein is prior art or relevant to the presently claimed invention, or that any publication specifically or implicitly referenced is prior art.
[0003] In existing circuit breaker technology, various methods are used for getting status of the breaker, be it live status or past status. However, in all such technologies, various modules are connected to various ports of the Circuit Breaker intelligent part (Control Section), wherein the Microprocessor (or DSP) keeps sending the data to its outer peripherals such as Bluetooth devices, Wi-Fi, Zigbee, TCP/IP or LED’s.
[0004] In existing circuit breakers, in order to notify an alarm of any line fault condition, various methods are adopted. One such method involves use of general purpose input/output (GPIOs) of digital signal processor (DSP) to send appropriate data at its port for desired activity. This activity can be used to generate an alarm and/or activate an attached actuator. However, the same feature can be used by using an I/O expander without harming the functionality of the circuit breaker(s). There is therefore a need in the art for an efficient communication architecture that allows remote monitoring and status acknowledgement of circuit breakers using I2C.
[0005] All publications herein are incorporated by reference to the same extent as if each individual publication or patent application were specifically and individually indicated to be incorporated by reference. Where a definition or use of a term in an incorporated reference is inconsistent or contrary to the definition of that term provided herein, the definition of that term provided herein applies and the definition of that term in the reference does not apply.
[0006] In some embodiments, the numbers expressing quantities of ingredients, properties such as concentration, reaction conditions, and so forth, used to describe and claim certain embodiments of the invention are to be understood as being modified in some instances by the term “about.” Accordingly, in some embodiments, the numerical parameters set forth in the written description and attached claims are approximations that can vary depending upon the desired properties sought to be obtained by a particular embodiment. In some embodiments, the numerical parameters should be construed in light of the number of reported significant digits and by applying ordinary rounding techniques. Notwithstanding that the numerical ranges and parameters setting forth the broad scope of some embodiments of the invention are approximations, the numerical values set forth in the specific examples are reported as precisely as practicable. The numerical values presented in some embodiments of the invention may contain certain errors necessarily resulting from the standard deviation found in their respective testing measurements.
[0007] As used in the description herein and throughout the claims that follow, the meaning of “a,” “an,” and “the” includes plural reference unless the context clearly dictates otherwise. Also, as used in the description herein, the meaning of “in” includes “in” and “on” unless the context clearly dictates otherwise.
[0008] The recitation of ranges of values herein is merely intended to serve as a shorthand method of referring individually to each separate value falling within the range. Unless otherwise indicated herein, each individual value is incorporated into the specification as if it were individually recited herein. All methods described herein can be performed in any suitable order unless otherwise indicated herein or otherwise clearly contradicted by context. The use of any and all examples, or exemplary language (e.g. “such as”) provided with respect to certain embodiments herein is intended merely to better illuminate the invention and does not pose a limitation on the scope of the invention otherwise claimed. No language in the specification should be construed as indicating any non-claimed element essential to the practice of the invention.
[0009] Groupings of alternative elements or embodiments of the invention disclosed herein are not to be construed as limitations. Each group member can be referred to and claimed individually or in any combination with other members of the group or other elements found herein. One or more members of a group can be included in, or deleted from, a group for reasons of convenience and/or patentability. When any such inclusion or deletion occurs, the specification is herein deemed to contain the group as modified thus fulfilling the written description of all Markush groups used in the appended claims.

OBJECTS OF THE INVENTION
[0010] An object of the present disclosure is to provide an improved method of remote monitoring and status acknowledgement of circuit breakers using I2C (Inter-IC) bus.
[0011] An object of the present disclosure is to provide efficient communication architecture for circuit breakers in power distribution systems.
[0012] An object of the present disclosure is to provide communication architecture for circuit breakers that can capture the faults instantaneously and generate requisite alerts/signals more easily.
[0013] An object of the present disclosure is to provide communication architecture for circuit breakers that can provide round the clock monitoring of the breaker status through a configured phone.
[0014] An object of the present disclosure is to provide communication architecture for circuit breakers that can alert by instantaneous SMS to multiple people.
[0015] An object of the present disclosure is to provide communication architecture for circuit breakers that can send messages to various servers or PCs on status of the circuit breaker.
[0016] An object of the present disclosure is to provide communication architecture for circuit breakers that can enable different types of visual indications such as LCD, LED or seven segment display.
[0017] An object of the present disclosure is to provide communication architecture for circuit breakers that can work as a secondary protection in the event of failure of primary protection.

SUMMARY
[0018] Aspects of the present disclosure relate to the field of circuit breakers. More particularly, the present disclosure relates to a system for remote monitoring and status acknowledgement of circuit breakers using I2C (Inter-IC) bus. In an aspect, the remote monitoring and status acknowledgement can be used for features including, but not limited to, visual indications (LCD, LED, Seven Segment Display), for activation of any actuator connected at its output, for sending SMS to various configured mobile/computing/portable devices. In an aspect, these SMSs can be used as alerts regarding status or fault, among other like purposes.
[0019] In another aspect of the present disclosure, the same status of the Breaker can also be acknowledged by simply using the two wires (I2C), without the need of using so many ports for processor. The processor can send the data at the directed address that can be among various options, a string of LED’s for visual indication, a GSM module for communicating with a GSM device, an Ethernet port for device connected on LAN etc.
[0020] In an aspect, the proposed communication system can enable display of the visual indicators without waiting for OS based Circuit breakers to boot. This can generate and capture the faults instantaneously. The proposed system can also solve problems that occur during trip fault capturing while the backend is still under booting mode. With the implementation of this system, the backend does not need to wait for the OS to boot but parallel, can issue the trip data and other commands etc.
[0021] In an aspect, system of the present disclosure can incorporate a control and decision making module and can act as a master to initiate all needed actions relating to communication of the breaker with the external world. This module can be a microprocessor/microcontroller, a DSP, or any intelligent device.
[0022] In an aspect, the system can further include an I/O expander module that can be connected to the control and decision making module by means say a two wire protocol (I2C), wherein the I/O expander module can expand data coming on I2C SDA line to multiple addressable lines (devices). In an aspect, I/O expander module can be required if the number of devices is more than one, wherein the I/O expander module can function or be configured to address various connected devices.
[0023] In an aspect, system of the present disclosure can further include an interface module that can include one or more actual address units that can be an array of LED’s for visual indication. Depending on the condition (trip or protection), a particular LED (or all) may glow. Viewing the particular LED, service personnel can come to know the status of the breaker. In an instance, if we use a buzzer in place of LED array, then the attached buzzer can be made to give an audible signal as an alert for the service engineer.
[0024] In an aspect, communication between the I/O expander module and the interface module can be through a GSM device or an Ethernet (or various other technologies) that can be attached to enable monitored of the circuit breaker at a distant location. This feature can also enable round the clock monitoring of the status of the breaker.
[0025] Various objects, features, aspects and advantages of the inventive subject matter will become more apparent from the following detailed description of preferred embodiments, along with the accompanying drawing figures in which like numerals represent like components.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
[0026] The accompanying drawings are included to provide a further understanding of the present disclosure, and are incorporated in and constitute a part of this specification. The drawings illustrate exemplary embodiments of the present disclosure and, together with the description, serve to explain the principles of the present disclosure.
[0027] FIG. 1 illustrates an exemplary implementation of Inter-integrated Circuit (I2C) protocol with multiple slave devices communicating with one or more master device.
[0028] FIG. 2 illustrates communication messages between the devices comprising address part, data part and clock (CLK)
[0029] FIG. 3 illustrates an exemplary block diagram of the system for communicating status of a circuit breaker in accordance with an embodiment of the present disclosure.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION
[0030] The following is a detailed description of embodiments of the disclosure depicted in the accompanying drawings. The embodiments are in such detail as to clearly communicate the disclosure. However, the amount of detail offered is not intended to limit the anticipated variations of embodiments; on the contrary, the intention is to cover all modifications, equivalents, and alternatives falling within the spirit and scope of the present disclosure as defined by the appended claims.
[0031] Each of the appended claims defines a separate invention, which for infringement purposes is recognized as including equivalents to the various elements or limitations specified in the claims. Depending on the context, all references below to the "invention" may in some cases refer to certain specific embodiments only. In other cases it will be recognized that references to the "invention" will refer to subject matter recited in one or more, but not necessarily all, of the claims.
[0032] Various terms as used herein are shown below. To the extent a term used in a claim is not defined below, it should be given the broadest definition persons in the pertinent art have given that term as reflected in printed publications and issued patents at the time of filing.
[0033] I2C Protocol Description: Inter-integrated Circuit (I2C) Protocol is a protocol that is intended to allow multiple “slave” digital integrated circuits (“chips”) to communicate with one or more “master” chips, as is shown in FIG. 1.It only requires two signal wires to exchange information.I2C requires a mere two wires, like asynchronous serial, but such two wires can support up to 1008 slave devices. Also, unlike SPI, I2C can support a multi-master system, allowing more than one master to communicate with all devices on the bus (although the master devices cannot talk to each other over the bus and must take turns using the bus lines).Most I2C devices can communicate at 100 kHz or 400 kHz. Each I2C bus includes two signals: SCL and SDA, wherein SCL is the clock signal and SDA is the data signal. The clock signal is always generated by the current bus master; some slave devices may force the clock low at times to delay the master sending more data (or to require more time to prepare data before the master attempts to clock it out).The I2C bus drivers are “open drain”, meaning that they can pull the corresponding signal line low, but cannot drive it high. Thus, there can be no bus contention where one device is trying to drive the line high while another tries to pull it low, eliminating the potential for damage to the drivers or excessive power dissipation in the system. Each signal line has a pull-up resistor on it, to restore the signal to high when no device is asserting it low.
[0034] Signal Levels: Since the devices on the bus do not actually drive the signals high, I2C allows for some flexibility in connecting devices with different I/O voltages. In general, in a system where one device is at a higher voltage than another, it may be possible to connect the two devices via I2C without any level shifting circuitry in between them.
[0035] As shown with reference to FIG. 2, messages between the devices can be broken up into two types of frames: an address frame where the master indicates the slave to which the message is being sent, and one or more data frames that are 8-bit data messages passed from master to slave or vice versa.
[0036] The present disclosure relates to the field of circuit breakers. More particularly, the present disclosure relates to remote monitoring and status acknowledgement of circuit breakers using I2C (Inter-IC) bus. Such remote monitoring and status acknowledgement can be used for features including, but not limited to, visual indications (LCD, LED, Seven Segment Display), for activation of any actuator connected at its output, for sending SMS to various configured mobile/computing/portable devices, for instance for, alerting them regarding status or fault, among other like features/purposes.
[0037] In an aspect, the same status of the Breaker can be acknowledged by simply using the two wires (I2C), without the need of using so many ports for processor. The processor keeps sending the data at the directed address. The directed address can be anything, like a string of LED’s for visual indication, a GSM module for communicating with a GSM device, an Ethernet port for device connected on LAN etc.
[0038] FIG. 3 illustrates an exemplary block diagram of system 300 for communicating status of circuit breakers in accordance with an embodiment of the present disclosure. In an aspect, as illustrated in FIG. 3, the proposed system can include a control and decision making module 302, an I/O expander module 304, and an interface module 306 that can comprise of a plurality of peripherals such as one or more visual indication units 306-1, one or more audio indication units 306-2 and one or more remote messaging units 306-3, connected with the I/O expander module304, wherein the peripherals 306-1, 306-2 and 306-3 can include, but are not limited to, a LED card, a display unit, an audio unit such as a buzzer, or a mobile device. In an embodiment, the control and decision making module 102 can be configured to sense one or more electrical parameters, and based on the user/administrator set threshold values, take one or more decisions.
[0039] In an aspect of the present disclosure, using the proposed system/architecture, in case a fault occurs in the main supply, at the time of the faults, one or more of the configured indications such as visual, audible, and/or remote messaging can be issued/given. In another aspect, the control module 302 can be configured to work as a master, and the addressed units 306 can be configured to work as slave, wherein each device connected to the bus can be software-addressable by a unique address. In order to initiate address frame, the master device 302 can leave SCL (Clock Pulse) high and pulls the SDA line low, which can put the slave devices (306-1, 306-2, 306-3) on notice that a transmission is about to start. The control unit 302 can initiate this by sending a byte of data, wherein first byte of I2C transfer can include slave address and data direction. The concerned unit can be connected through the I/O expander 304, wherein the control unit 302 can send the address of the concerned unit via the I/O expander 304. In an exemplary implementation, the address can be 7 bits long, and followed by a direction bit. Like all data bytes, the address can be transferred with the most significant bit first. The slave (addressed unit) 306 can then respond with an acknowledgement bit that can be ready for communication. The master 302 can then send the data bytes to the slave 306, wherein depending on the number of bits of I/O expander 304, the data string can be one or more number of bytes length. In an aspect, display unit can have ‘n’ number of LEDs, out of which the master unit 302 can glow the ‘m’ number of LEDs, wherein m = n. Corresponding LEDs can accordingly be pulled up/ low to give the intended indication. In the same way, the master 302 can make use of other slaves to fulfil their purposes.
[0040] In an embodiment, based on the decision made, the module 302 can initiate the controlling activity. For instance, in case the decision is to activate one of the attached actuators, then the actuator can be activated and configured to perform the desired task. Similarly, if the decision is to broadcast an SMS relating to load line fault to one or more configured mobile devices, the message can be delivered to the intended recipients. Such a messaging platform can act as an acknowledgement to the concerned users/administrators or connected computing devices.
[0041] In an aspect, one of the problems intended to be solved by the proposed architecture is to display the LED indications, which increases the response/efficiency of the system by not waiting for OS based Circuit breakers to boot and then act. This can generate and capture the faults instantaneously. This proposed architecture also solves problems that occur during trip fault capturing while the backend is still under booting mode. With the implementation of this architecture, the backend does not need to wait for the OS to boot but parallel, can issue the trip data and other commands etc.
[0042] The present architecture also makes fault indications faster and efficient with the use of minimal components. Not only this, the proposed method may also increase the flexibility of attaching peripherals to the Circuit Breakers. In another aspect, one or more configured users can also gate the results of live circuit breakers round the clock at any time anywhere.
[0043] According to another embodiment, the disclosed system of remote monitoring of circuit breakers can enable round the clock monitoring of breaker status on a configured computing device such as a mobile phone, PC, Laptop, tablet PC, smart phone, among other like devices. Aspects of the present disclosure can also enable one or more configured users/administrators to be intimated one or more breaker operational/performance parameters through means such as instantaneous SMS. Architecture of the present disclosure can also be used as secondary protection if primary protection of breaker fails. In yet another aspect, messages to various servers, or PCs for status of the circuit breaker can be generated and dispatched as configured by the system. Furthermore, visual alarm using minimum lines of GPIOs, and audible alarm (example buzzer) etc. can be configured.
[0044] In an aspect, architecture of the disclosed communication monitoring a circuit breaker can be divided into three main sections, wherein the first section can be a control and decision making unit, which can act as a master and initiate all needed actions relating to communication needs of the breaker with the external world. This unit can be among various options, a microprocessor/microcontroller, a DSP or any intelligent device.
[0045] In an aspect, the second section of the present architecture can be anI/O expander that can be connected to the control and decision making unit. The I/O expander can be connected with the control and decision making unit by means of a two wire protocol (I2C), wherein the role of the I/O expander is to expand the date coming on I2C SDA line to multiple addressable lines (devices). The I/O expander is optional if the address device is only one. However, if the number of devices is more than one, the I/O expander is required to address the various connected devices.
[0046] In an aspect, the third section is the actual addressable unit, which can be an array of LED’s for visual indication, a buzzer or string of buzzers, or any GSM module. Depending on the condition (trip or protection),a particular LED (or all) may glow. Viewing the particular LED, a service personnel can come to know the status of the breaker. In the same way even Buzzer can be activated to send the message to the monitoring person that some fault has occurred.
[0047] Considering that the site may be required to be monitored at a distant location, a GSM device or the Ethernet (or any of the various other known technologies) can be used to get the status of the breaker. This feature can also be used to get the status of the breaker round the clock wherein the round the clock remote monitoring of the status of the circuit breakers can be done on a configured computing device such as a mobile phone, PC, Laptop, tablet PC, smart phone, among other like devices.
[0048] While the foregoing describes various embodiments of the invention, other and further embodiments of the invention may be devised without departing from the basic scope thereof. The scope of the invention is determined by the claims that follow. The invention is not limited to the described embodiments, versions or examples, which are included to enable a person having ordinary skill in the art to make and use the invention when combined with information and knowledge available to the person having ordinary skill in the art.

ADVANTAGES OF THE INVENTION
[0049] The present disclosure provides an improved method of remote monitoring and status acknowledgement of circuit breakers using I2C (Inter-IC) bus.
[0050] The present disclosure provides efficient communication architecture for circuit breakers in power distribution systems.
[0051] The present disclosure provides communication architecture for circuit breakers that can capture the faults instantaneously and generate requisite alerts/signals with very little delay.
[0052] The present disclosure provides communication architecture for circuit breakers that can provide round the clock monitoring of the breaker status through a configured phone.
[0053] The present disclosure provides communication architecture for circuit breakers that can alert by instantaneous SMS to multiple users.
[0054] The present disclosure provides communication architecture for circuit breakers that can send messages to various servers or PCs on status of the circuit breaker.
[0055] The present disclosure provides communication architecture for circuit breakers that can enable different types of visual indications such as LCD, LED or seven segment display.
[0056] The present disclosure provides communication architecture for circuit breakers that can work as a secondary protection in the event of failure of primary protection.
,CLAIMS:1. A system for monitoring status of a circuit breaker, the system comprising:
a control and decision making module configured to act as a master and configured to initiate one or more actions relating to communication of the circuit breaker with external component(s);
an I/O expander module operatively coupled with the control and decision making module by means of a I2C SDA line and following a two wire protocol (I2C), wherein the I/O expander module is configured to expand data coming on I2C SDA line to multiple addressable lines; and an interface module operatively coupled with the I/O expander module and comprising one or more address units.
2. The system of claim 1, wherein the control and decision making module is further configured to sense one or more electrical parameters and take one or more decisions based on user/administrator set threshold values.
3. The system of claim 1, wherein the control and decision making module is a microprocessor/microcontroller or a DSP.
4. The system of claim 1, wherein the control and decision making module is configured to initiate a controlling activity based on one or more sensed electrical parameters.
5. The system of claim 5, wherein the controlling activity is activation of an actuator attached to the circuit breaker and is configured to perform a desired controlling task.
6. The system of claim 1, wherein the I/O expander module communicates data to the one or more address units through a GSM device or the ETHERNET.
7. The system of claim 1, wherein the one or more address units are an array of LED’s for visual indication.
8. The system of claim 1, wherein the one or more address units comprise any or a combination of audio indication unit, visual indication unit, and remote messaging unit.
9. The system of claim 1, wherein the one or more address units is one or more computing devices such as a mobile phone, PC, Laptop, tablet PC, smart phone.