The Dakshin Haryana Bijli Vitran Nigam (DHBVN) will start installing the first batch of smart meters, under the smart metering pilot project, in Gurugram for 1,000 new consumers in DLF Phase-2 starting February 15. The move will do away with the need for manual meter reading and resulting disputes, reducing thefts and increasing billing efficiency.

Problems such as erratic and inflated power bills, meter tampering and theft are prevalent in the current manual meter reading system. The most recent cases were reported in December from sectors 5 and 55, where some residents received bills of several housand rupees even when their houses had been vacant for the past few months.

“We are almost ready to say goodbye to manual meters from March 2019. This system will end all nuisance related to electricity billing under the current manual reading system. The pilot project is being launched from DLF Phase-2 as the DHVBN is close to completing the duct construction work under the Smart Grid project, and the area is fit for installation of smart meters,” DHVBN chief engineer (Gurugram) Sanjiv Chopra said, adding that DLF Phase-2 residents will get the first electricity bills in the first week of March.

These bills will be generated from Hisar. “We will assess the negative and positive aspects of the first lot of smart meters after the first billing cycle and accordingly proceed to replace the 4.5 lakh existing electricity metres in the city,” Chopra said.

The DHBVN stopped issuing fresh power connections since it started working on the Smart Grid project in May 2018. About 15,000 fresh power applications are pending and these consumers will directly get smart meters.

“Currently, the discom has hired a private agency for meter reading and bill generation. On an average, we receive 100 complaints a day of false meter reading, inflated bills, meter tampering, all of which are possible in the current system. Many disputes of electricity billing are pending in various courts also,” Chopra said, adding that smart metering would improve distribution.

The DHBVN official said smart meters are fitted with SIM cards with cloud application feature to store consumers’ details.

“In case a consumer tries to tamper with the meter, it will be detected at the database centre. So a consumer will not be able to complain of false reading and land in disputes. We settled 1,500 such disputes in September-october last year,” the DHBVN chief engineer said, adding that the discom sealed 250 meter for tampering after vigilance raids from April to June 2018.

The announcement was well received by residents, who hope the system will rid them of the need to run from pillar to post to get their power bills corrected.

“We hope smart meters work properly and we get its benefit. The current system of manual meter reading is problematic as they generate erratic bills and we have to fight for rectifications,” DLF Phase-2 resident Sanjeet Malik said.

Gurugram is only the second city in the country to get smart meters under the pilot project after the NDMC area of the national capital, deputy general manager Smart Metering Group EESL Narender Saini said.

The project is being overseen by the Energy Efficiency Services Limited (EESL)—A joint venture company of public sector units of ministry of power. EESL has selected six cities in Haryana, including Hisar, Faridabad, Karnal, Panipat, Panchkula and Gurugram, for this project.

“One of the best features of smart metering is that consumer and discom can assess real time power consumption and plan. This real time consumption assessment is not possible meterwise and feeder-wise in the manual system,” Saini said.

The official said that the objective of the Haryana government and the Centre is to improve power distribution system to make it consumer friendly.

About 250 Fortune500 companies are located in the city where electricity distribution system is primitive and costs an annual power loss of 15-17%, leading to public outcry every summer when demand overrides supply.

First Published: Feb 06, 2019 14:53 IST