Burla: Along with time, metering solutions have been evolved through research and development from earlier electromechanical meters to static electronics meters and now smart meters for accurate measurement of electricity consumption by consumers. The smart meters are nothing but advance version of static meters, which are being used for last 20 years. In this advance version, feature of ability to communicate, makes these static electronic meters “smart”. These smart meters have been tested thoroughly at different stages in different environments and are certified by authorized agencies.
Therefore, Ministry of Energy, Government of India, has directed all discoms in the country to install smart meters for enormous benefit to consumers and reduce the various activities related to the collection of meter readings and billing, and also to avoid all kinds of errors in the billing process by discoms.
The Ministry of Energy, Government of India, published a gazette notification (CG-DL-E-19082021-229126) in this connection on August 17, 2021, and directed to install smart meters by December 2023. Hon’ble Odisha State Electricity Regulatory Commission (OERC) has directed all discoms in Odisha vide letter no. OERC/Engg/2/2017/609 dated 03/05/2023 to complete the installation of smart meters at the earliest. We at TPWODL install smart meters as per the direction of the Hon’ble OERC. The smart meters can be benefited in following way.
I. The smart meters can record & communicate the electricity consumption units for a longer period of time, so that the consumers can extract their past consumption history. This enables consumers to analyse and control electricity consumption.
II. The accurate meter reading can be fetched remotely by the company without manual interventions to eliminate possibilities of any error for billing purpose. It enables timely billing to ensure slab benefits to consumers. .
III. Neither the consumer nor the discom has to depend on the meter readers to go to the door step for the meter reading.
IV. Smart meters are available in both prepaid and post-paid modes, and there are many more benefits available for consumers.
V. The smart meters enable discoms the faster restoration by quickly identifying power failure in area fed from substations/ networks. Smart metering system also facilitates accurate energy accounting of the network to help in AT&C loss reduction.
