AFRICAN UTILITY WEEK EYE ON AFRICAN MARKET IS AFRICA READY FOR SMART METER IMPLEMENTATION AND MANUFACTURING? By Nicolette Pombo-van Zyl, Programme Director, African Utility Week, Spintelligent “Communication is the key to smart meter success! Communication providers therefore have a huge opportunity in the global rollout of smart metering.” Michael J Rhode, Director: Technical Services, Knysna Municipality, South Africa and President of the Southern Africa Revenue Protection Association (SARPA). The business case for smart metering has been made worldwide as a tool to increase revenue collection and reduce non-technical losses. It has the potential to address Africa’s power challenges, but in many case studies it has been highlighted that the selection of the right technology is key. Utilities often choose technologies without the due diligence and requirement assessments and there are numerous considerations to be made regarding installation, maintenance, operations and service level agreements. During the African Utility Week advisory board meetings earlier this year these concerns were raised and the question of whether African utilities and municipalities are ready to implement smart metering technologies was discussed at length. According to Christa Robijn, Programme Director, East Africa Power Infrastructure Convention (Eapic), “Smart metering is not about the meter, it’s about the knowledge gained. If you put the right technology in place, you will obtain useful data.” Michael J Rhode, Director: Technical Services, Knysna Municipality, South Africa and President of the Southern Africa Revenue Protection Association (SARPA) will impart his wealth of information on metering communications and infrastructure at the 14th annual African Utility Week conference 32 14TH ANNUAL Co-located: Technology is in a constant state of advancement with Tata Power in India recently launching a new smart metering technology project which is the first in the world where ADR and AMI are being used in the same framework. Another example is the integrated partnership between IBM, Honeywell and Landis+Gyr who have taken smart metering technology collaboration to the next level with components including Radio Frequency Mesh based communication, ADR, smart meters, MDMS and the integration of IT operational technology. With the wide implementation of smart metering rollouts all over the world, it seems that Africa has the opportunity to learn from the mistakes and decisions made in other markets. Africa’s ageing infrastructure is perhaps not ready to accept smart metering technology, but utilities have the option to explore wireless solutions. Michael Rhode, Director of Technical Services of Knysna Municipality South Africa, says: “Communication is the key to smart meter success! Communication providers therefore have a huge opportunity in the global rollout of smart metering.” Rhode has presented many papers on smart grid and also has a keen interest in the revenue protection field. As an advisory board member to African Utility Week, Rhode has been instrumental in determining the key challenges that utilities face on a daily basis around metering, technical losses and revenue protection. During the metering communications focus day at the 14th annual African Utility Week in Cape Town in May, Rhode will uncover the challenging questions of whether prepayment meters have taken off in Africa as was expected and what the hurdles are for embracing this technology. Zimbabwe and South Sudan attract funding for meters Two countries that have shown the ability to assess their needs effectively and implement a metering strategy accordingly are Zimbabwe and South Sudan. The key denominator between these two countries is investment, emphasising the need for stakeholder engagement between utilities and the private sector. Zesa Holdings in Zimbabwe secured US$35 million from the regional bank, African Export and Import Bank, to install pre-paid meters across the country. The African Development Bank is supporting South Sudan in deploying 20 000 pre-paid meters with a US$26 million grant. The aim of both projects is to rehabilitate and expand the distribution networks. Director of African Development Bank Alex Rugamba recently said: “The current situation of low level of power generation, coupled with inefficient distribution networks, has adversely affected living standards of the population and restrained business development. Currently only about 1% of South Sudan’s estimated 10 million people has access to grid electricity.” The South Sudan Electricity Corporation (SSEC) will be further supported by financial, project and technical training – a crucial step to ensure sustainability of the metering rollout programme. Global lessons shared Brazil has seen its fair share of regulatory challenges around metering projects and rollouts, even impacting meter suppliers. The original mandate to roll out smart meters across the country was amended to install METERING INTERNATIONAL ISSUE - 1 | 2014