Improving the reliability of energy supply utilizing smart energy meter system based on GSM: case study in Pakistan

In the past few decades, due to the outmoded power system infrastructure, Pakistan power system is facing many complex problems. Reducing the gap between supply, demand and improving the reliability of energy supply are key issues of existing energy management these days. Utilities in electricity system are destroying the amounts of income each year due to the load shedding. Traditional meter reading in Pakistan leads to many problems such as time consuming, overbilling, outdated, and inefficient work. Also, manually collection of bills from these meters always open the door to the corruption in the form of overbilling which is a challenge of electricity theft. So, this paper presents a smart energy meter system based on Global System for Mobile (GSM) is very useful for obtaining meter reading when needed, the meter reader does not requirement to visit each customer to get the energy data consumed and distribute the bill slips. The design of microcontroller can be used to observe and record meter readings. If the customer disclaimer, no need to send anyone to disconnect the customer connection. The utility can cut and reconnect client connections through the Short Message Service (SMS). In addition, customers can check the status of power (load) from anywhere. In this system, the smart meter readings are transmitted by using GSM to inform the users on daily basis. Moreover, it is useful to eliminate the need for full feeder disconnection during load shedding and to remotely allocate minimum power during load shedding.