Abstract: While many questions still surround the creation and deployment of the smart grid, the need for a reliablecommunications infrastructure is indisputable. Developers of the IEEE 1901.2 standard identified difficult channel conditionscharacteristic of low-frequency powerline communications and implemented an orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM)architecture using advanced modulation and channel-coding techniques. This strategy helped to ensure a robust communicationsnetwork for the smart grid.