A Real time electricity usage monitoring system using smart meters for wastage detection in Kenya

Abstract

Electricity utilities face dual challenges of generation and distribution. While many utilities are now migrating their operations into modern digitized platforms, most of these utilities have had to rely on old systems to carry out and monitor their commercial activities such as connectivity activity, itinerary scheduling, meter and device management, cycle billing, collections management and management reporting. This is causing utilities to reimagine customer engagements with a focus on feedback, put in place loss detection systems in their grids, use predictive models to schedule maintenance and other asset-management activities, equipping field workers with mobile devices that let them access technical instructions while in the field and deploy customized systems to help manage the extending networks. The main focus of this study was to design a real time electricity usage detection system using smart meters in Kenya, a system that would aid utility companies in providing real time feedback for service provision and anomaly detection. This research was done using smart meters to remotely record usage and record those messages manually into a web based portal. While it was not possible to replace existing old meters with the smart meters, the study made use of a test kit to simulate power consumption and usage recording. This study has put in place a model system that can be remotely connected to a smart meter and feedback generated in real time