Cost effective wireless network based automated energy meter monitoring system for Sri Lanka perspective

Published Online May 2018 in MECS

Electricity is one of the very important requirements of human being for their comfortable life. It is a non-renewable energy source therefore we must use it judiciously for its sustainable utilization [1, 2]. In Sri Lanka, Ceylon Electricity Board (CEB) supplies the electricity in a huge ratio in which most of the consumers are not pleased and satisfied with the services of CEB; because of traditional meter reading and billing methods adopted which requires enormous number of labor and long working hours to collect metering data for billing process. Manual billing is sometimes restricted and slowed down by various reasons. Human operative traditional metering and billing method has high possibility to be inaccurate. Sometimes the energy meter is placed in a location where it cannot be easily accessible by the meter reader when it is located at mountain or large building [7]. Due to the increased population and industrialization in a country like Sri Lanka, it requires facilitated and trusted service with minimum operating cost. A better method of metering and billing process is proposed in this paper called Automated Energy Meter Monitoring System (AEMMS) to reduce the above mentioned disputes. AEMMS provides capabilities for remote metering and monitoring the energy supply to the consumer meter. It handles all the information of the consumer regarding energy consumption through Energy Management Software tool. Also it manages and automates the resources and other associated operations which were managed by manpower previously such as conventional meter reading and traditional bill payment.

Electricity theft is also a common problem to the power distribution sectors in Sri Lanka. Sri Lanka electricity board faces loss of near 30% of its total supply of electricity where a major portion of power loss is due to electricity theft [17]. During the year 2011, officials from electricity board have caught 2935 offenders who used electricity illegally and earned about 199 million LKR by imposing penalties on them [17, 19]. In an attempt to counter the trend, Electricity Board Officials are forecasting to take in tough laws such as withdrawing electricity supplies to houses or industries who are engaged in the act of electricity theft. The economic impacts of theft reduce the income from the sale of electricity and increase the necessity of overcharging to consumers. Only generating more power is not enough to meet present day electricity requirements. Electricity consumption and losses have to be closely monitored and managed to efficiently utilize the generated power [18]. This proposed system also provides an effective mechanism for detecting electricity theft in household site.

The remainder of this paper is organized as follow: Section 2 and 3 discuss the problem definition and objectives of the study. Section 4 discusses the related work of this study and Section 5 is dedicated for research overview. From Section 6 to Section 9, research methodologies and implementation are shown. Section 10 expresses the results and discussion while Section 11 concludes the paper.

• II.    Problem Definition

Presently, the most of the houses and industries have mechanical watt hour meters (WHM) in Sri Lanka for measuring electricity consumption and the metering and billing system of electricity board is not fully monitored and automated. End of every month, a meter reader from the electricity board visits every household meter and collects the electricity utility meter reading manually which will later be entered manually in the billing software of electricity board for billing and payment collection. Customers often go to electricity board or other payment center for paying this bill.

Nevertheless, the effort of collecting electricity utility meter reading data related to the consumption of each and every consumer is a difficult task. It requires a great number of labors for collecting and processing the meters readings. The procedures of sending the bills to customer are very laborious and inept. This process is not secured and probability to be inaccurate is high. Further electricity board losses a high percentage of electricity revenue due to power theft, inaccurate meter reading and unwillingness of consumers to pay electricity bills due on time [7]. To solve the above mentioned problems, Sri Lanka electricity board is in need of an effective monitoring and controlling system.

• III.    Objectives

The main objective of this research is to develop and implementing a fully “Automated Energy Metering and Monitoring System” having advanced competences like remote metering and monitoring the electricity supply to the consumer energy meter. The research is about to handle all the information of the consumer regarding energy consumption using a software tool.

The study also aims the following objects:

• •    To remote monitoring and controlling the domestic energy meter reading without visiting the site.

• •    To reduce the labour cost, reading error and operational cost required in the manual metering.

• •    Provide an effective theft detection mechanism to the energy provider in case of altering the energy meter.

• •    Provide remote disconnect and re-connect facilities to deal with the customers who have large outstanding dues.

• IV.    Related Work

In this study, authors investigated the existing traditional meter reading system associated with CEB of Sri Lanka and discovered various drawbacks and difficulties. Here authors have studied different technologies and methods available to reduce or overcome the meter reading problems. Finally authors modeled out a worthy and feasible solution for Sri Lanka standpoint after analyzing the number of research papers and studies. Some of the important papers are summarized and evaluated in this section.