By enabling prepaid electricity, reduced tampering, and detailed data, Kamstrup meters provided by local partner Livewire help municipality evolve.
Prepaid electricity is power bought before it’s consumed, enabling better load management.
For ESKOM, municipalities and power utilities, prepaid electricity enables easier load management, predictable revenue, and dependable supply.
When Lephalale Local Municipality in Limpopo, northern South Africa, opted to replace its existing electricity meters with Kamstrup’s OMNIPOWER® prepaid meter, the results were reduced tampering and theft, revenue recovery, a better overview of consumption, and user-friendly prepayment options for local consumers.
The project was executed by local Kamstrup partner Livewire and is helping the municipality make the most of its limited electricity resources and cope with blackouts.
Like many other countries, South Africa is increasingly being electrified, but the growing load demand leads to occasional blackouts. Local authorities need to make the most of the scarce power resources while also preventing meter tampering and electricity theft.
Lephalale Local Municipality is a perfect example. The fast-growing municipality had little overview of electricity consumption and losses through theft and tampering. According to electrical engineer Tienie Loots, revenue losses were approximately 40%, or losses of up to ZAR 1 million (approx. EUR 48,750) a year. Clearly, a solution needed to be found.
Lephalale Local Municipality signed an agreement with Livewire Engineering and Consulting, a Kamstrup partner in South Africa, to deploy a solution that would enable prepaid electricity, reduced tampering, and detailed data.
Meter replacement is at the heart of the Livewire solution. Around 7,500 existing meters will be replaced with Kamstrup OMNIPOWER® single-phase and three-phase meters, which handle prepayment by communicating with Livewire’s systems over a P2P connection using 3rd party modems. Consumers can easily purchase electricity through the Livemopay mobile app and at several local banks and retailers. All meters are linked to the Livewire IT platform, alerting the municipality in case of tampering or theft.
The project began in January 2023, and the first meters were activated on the Livemopay platform by the end of March 2023. Livewire managed the roll-out and installation of the new meters through a local team and manage the electricity vending systems.
With the Kamstrup meters, the municipality can better utilise the available electricity and provide a reliable and efficient service to its consumers thanks to a better overview of daily consumption and spending patterns.
“We can access data from smart meters to record electricity use every half hour, which provides a more accurate picture of consumption and demand, and with the prepaid solution, energy sales can be processed on time-of-use basis,” says Lesego Matlwa, Chief Financial Officer of Lephalale Local Municipality. “This smart metering solution together with Livewire’s intelligent platform is proving to be a great solution for Lephalale and the community at large. With many consumers now opting into the smart prepayment option using the Kamstrup meter, the future looks bright for Lephalale and its residents in managing their electricity consumption.”
– Tienie Loots, Electrical Engineer, Lephalale
The prepayment system means that consumers cannot cheat the system, which means reduced theft and losses.
“By eliminating meter tampering, we immediately gained 500,000 rand a year, which reduced the revenue losses,” says Tienie Loots.
The Kamstrup meters also helped the technical staff at Livewire manage and control the electricity grid in response to grid blackouts (commonly known as “load shedding” in South Africa).
“The Kamstrup OMNIPOWER® meters can be used with our load control project to help reduce the cold load pickup after load shedding,” says Attie van Jaarsveldt, CEO of Livewire.
Feedback from the local team in Lephalale indicates that they were very satisfied with their cooperation with Kamstrup on the project, describing the company as a professional organisation with high-quality products and services.
The solution helps local consumers manage energy consumption and save on costs. Local citizens are satisfied that electricity purchases can be done seamlessly through a mobile app, which also allows them to monitor their daily usage.
The OMNIPOWER® meters can send signals to external load control devices, meaning that consumers can switch off non-essential loads such as pool pumps when they do not need them. This consumer level load management is crucial to reduce the load on a strained electricity grid, and having the option available on a cell phone makes the process much simpler.
“This is another reason why customers are satisfied using smart meters, and it shows how consumers become aware of their power consumption,” remarks Lesego Matlwa.
With the Livewire and Kamstrup solution, Lephalale Local Municipality is well on its way to reducing losses and recovering revenue. In addition, it is helping the municipality evolve into a digital organisation where operational decisions are made based on detailed data from meters and substations.
The municipality is satisfied and is applying for funding to replace all meters in Lephalale as soon as the budget allows. And Tienie Loots, who helped the municipality find a solution to its problems with revenue loss, is a happy man.
“I’m glad I could recover all this money, and the Kamstrup meter enabled me to do that,” he concludes.
Digitalisation begins with the devices bring intelligence to the edge of the grid. Our electricity meters offer second-to-none smart meter functionality – including your choice of communication technology.
Remote reading of electricity meters increases efficiency and customer satisfaction. Kamstrup offers both mobile and network solutions.
