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Access Energy Cooperative is in the process of installing a new meter reading system throughout our entire service territory. At this time equipment has been installed at all of the substations and approximately 80 percent of the meters have been changed.
Over 7,400 new automated meters have been installed with about 1,800 left to be changed, said David Peer, Director of Engineering. The change over should be completed by the end of April.
The AMR system not only allows meters to be read remotely from the Mt. Pleasant office, which reduces meter reading costs, but also detects power outages. "In November we were able to detect nine outages prior to members calling in," Peer said.
Even though the new system automates the reading and billing procedure, members will still be able to read their own meter.
The TWACS (two way automatic communication system) will automatically read our members meters every month from our Mt. Pleasant office. This will not only reduce our meter reading costs but also allow quick access to meter reading as needed. Each meter will contain a small electronic unit that will utilize power line carrier technology to transmit the meter reading from the meter to the substation supplying your power. There, it will be collected and relayed to our Mt. Pleasant office via telephone line to a computer that will interface with our billing system.
As we gain experience with the system, we will be working on other uses for it. Since the system utilizes two-way communication, the meter not only talks to our Mt. Pleasant office, but we will be able to talk to the meter. Having the ability to "talk" to the meter provides many opportunities for the future.
One area of particular interest is outage notification. During an outage when you are attempting to call in and report your power is out, the phone lines are normally very busy. Only a few members can get through to inform us they are out of power. With the new TWACS system we will be able to "ask" the meter if you have power. The meters that do not report back to our office identify the customers that are out of power. This quick system-wide identification of the area without power will greatly improve our ability to dispatch crews to fix the problems. Once power is restored, we will be able to "ask" the meter and verify you are back in service. This is only one example of many ways this new system can be used to improve our service to our members and help save money in the future.
Click here to view a larger version of the Automated Meter Reading Schedule.
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| | |  | | | | | | | Report an Outage?
319.385.1580 - Local
800.452.7819 - Toll-Free |
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