IntelliSmart Infrastructure Pvt Ltd (IntelliSmart), a joint venture between National Investment & Infrastructure Fund (NIIF) and Energy Efficiency Services Ltd (EESL), is India’s leading smart metering and digital solutions provider. In this exclusive interaction, we have Anil Rawal, MD & CEO, IntelliSmart Infrastructure Pvt Ltd, discussing how IntelliSmart is contributing significantly to India’s smart metering endeavours, especially through the RDSS programme. Rawal feels that while smart metering can help discoms to become commercially efficient, smart meter deployment needs a consumer-centric approach.
The broad mandate of IntelliSmart is to help state power discoms with their smart meter rollout programme. Please elaborate on the specific activities that IntelliSmart will undertake in the smart metering domain.
IntelliSmart has been established with the core purpose of becoming the most preferred digital partner of utilities. While we, as part of our mandate, continue to focus on smart meter implementation for discoms, as a digital solutions company, we are exploring opportunities to leverage the Advanced Metering Infrastructure, consumer data management and AI/ML-based analysis to create value for the utilities by enabling them to develop additional revenue sources.
In predictive AI/ML-based meter data analytics, we have already run two pilot programmes with our partners which have shown the prospect for discoms to maximise revenue and create business opportunities in the form of optimisation of energy consumption, appliance energy tracking & analysis, consumption usage pattern, trends and forecasts, and theft detection, among others.
In our efforts to pioneer digitalisation in the power distribution sector, we are also evaluating several digital initiatives such as enterprise IT infrastructure, smart meter hub, gas metering and P2P blockchain for solar rooftops, among others.
We also understand that the ‘TOTEX’ model, which is now part of the standard bidding document (SBD) for smart metering, was introduced by IntelliSmart. Tell us more.
It may not be correct to say that IntelliSmart has introduced the TOTEX model as this has been the Ministry of Power innovation. However, it takes a lot from the erstwhile EESL/IntelliSmart model of ‘Pay as you Use’, which has been a pioneer OPEX model in smart metering.
The single-biggest challenge of the smart metering programme is the upfront investment that the projects require. In order to address this financial predicament which can further add to the utilities’ financial difficulties, a decision was made to implement smart metering projects on TOTEX under DBFOOT model.
EESL and IntelliSmart, through their smart metering projects, demonstrated that the adopted financial modelenables the state electricity distribution companies to carry out smart meter rollout at scalewithout bearing the pressure of upfront investment.
In Assam, IntelliSmart won what was India’s first competitively bid smart meter installation project. Please elaborate. What is the current status of the project?
IntelliSmart secured its first order to install over 6 lakh smart meters in Assam in November 2021. It was the country’s first-ever competitively bid smart metering project by any state on TOTEX in DBFOOT model. With this win, we also became the first company in smart metering to undertake the Government’s ambitious smart prepaid metering programme under RDSS in northeast India.
As of now, we have already completed implementation of 50 per cent of the project by volume in Assam. We have also introduced several innovations at the operational level like Smart Meter Operations (SMO) centralised management software application and end-to-end process innovation which have streamlined and expedited implementation processes. Moreover, our consumer engagement initiatives – aimed at improving the overall consumer experience – were synced with the operation plan and mapped to project milestones to develop grassroots connect which led to a substantial rise in the level of consumer satisfaction in the state.
In April this year, IntelliSmart won a major smart meter order under RDSS in Uttar Pradesh. What is the scope of the order, and what is the completion schedule?
Yes, IntelliSmart has secured the order of installation of 67 lakh prepaid smart meters along with substantial service cabling and auxiliaries in 14 districts in Uttar Pradesh, falling under the purview of Pashchimanchal Vidyut Vitran Nigam Ltd (PVVNL). With this win, we have undertaken the largest competitively bid smart metering project awarded so far under the Revamped Distribution Sector Scheme (RDSS) in the country. The completion schedule is as per the timeline laid out in the contract.
Based on your own experience in Assam and now Uttar Pradesh, what are the typical challenges associated with such mega smart metering rollouts?
The first challenge in the smart metering project is acceptance of intervention by consumers. Our experience on ground showed that there is need to adopt a consumer-centric approach through which we educate people about the benefits of smart meters in a way that they start conceiving the adoption of smart meters as a positive step and not a move against them.
There is also the issue of consumers not willing to pay for their electricity, leading to humongous losses for the discoms. The challenge is to get the consumers to understand that electricity is no longer free as it used to be thought of in the past, and the fact that a free supply of electricity puts an exponential economic burden on the nation.
The third challenge is a degree of passivity on the part of the discoms. Power utilities need to think beyond the conventional to go digital in order to be financially and operationally strong. Discoms need to enable digitalisation as a supplementary initiative along with smart metering to make the most out of it. There is also a need to train utilities’ manpower to manage a digitalised grid.
RDSS has already opened the market. The sheer volume of tenders floated in just over eight months shows the huge interest and the opportunity that exist in the industry.
In general, how do you rate opportunities for IntelliSmart under RDSS? Also, do you feel that RDSS gives a good opportunity to smart meter manufacturers as well as other entrepreneurs to groom into developers?
The main objective of RDSS is to improve the quality, reliability, and affordability of power supply through a financially efficient distribution sector and bring down the AT&C losses of the discoms to 12-15 per cent by 2024-25.
Under RDSS, the Government of India has committed to investing up to 15 per cent as capex contribution in smart meter projects that will be executed under TOTEX mode. The government expects that with this investment, more lenders will enter the fray and more states might express interest in adopting smart meters.
RDSS has already opened the market. The sheer volume of tenders floated in just over eight months show the huge interest and the opportunity that exist in the industry. And this opportunity is available for all players, depending on their ability to create the right economies of scale.
Do you think that prepaid metering can be the best solution towards making state discoms more commercially efficient? What other policy measures could complement prepaid metering to make government-owned power distribution a profitable business?
Yes, smart metering is the one of the best solutions for discoms to improve their financial and operational efficiency.
There are both short-term and long-term gains in adopting smart meters. In the short run, discoms will have improved billing efficiency, reduced operational expenditure, fewer complaints from customers and better user experience. Prepaid meters will further induce consumers, who till date have not paid for electricity, to pay power consumption, which will further bolster Discoms’ financials.
In the long run, smart meter AMI, with its granular demand-side data management capability, will enable the power distribution sector to employ smart grid in the country to address the existing concerns of T&D losses, peak load management, improved reliability, better asset management and increased grid visibility while ensuring uninterrupted electricity for all.
Smart meter data, through analytics, can draw various operational and consumer-oriented conclusions, having potential for enhanced revenue profiles for utilities and various value-added services for consumers.
The application of data analytics includes more efficient and cost-effective network asset management, billing insights and demand forecasting. Digitalisation and Data Analytics are complimentary to each other and collectively offer significant upside to the utilities while implementing smart metering program under RDSS programme.
For realizing the gains of digitalisation, a parallel programme needs be run along with RDSS on data analytics and artificial intelligence applications.
