Information Technology Interventions For Energy Accounting

The energy accounting exercise includes the establishment of an energy measurement system and preparation of energy balance associated to the various responsibility areas, as explained in the previously. The exercise is highly data intensive as it includes a large number of feeders at the 11 kV and 0.4 kV level connected from different substations, along with each feeder serving a large number of consumers of several categories.

Advanced IT technologies are helpful in the preparation of electrical network database and documentation and consolidation of consumer details that are necessary steps in energy accounting. Each consumer could be identified along with the Distribution transformer by that s/he is fed, and then each Distribution transformer could be identified with the feeder on which the transformer is installed.  In turn, each feeder could be identified with the substation from that electric supply is received.  This could be done through giving one 'Code No.' to each consumer that would be her/his'technical address 'on the bill.  Additionally the bill should involve the identification of meter reader and applicable tariffs.

The energy accounting would need constant review and modification to bring it to a stage and level wherein a reasonably true picture emerges. Considering the volume of data and nature of job, it would be essential to computerize the energy accounting system to produce (MIS) reports for various levels of management. This would facilitate remedial measures to improve billing. In medium and long term, it would facilitate to take systemic improvement measures.

Computerized billing software placed at Division/sub-division level should be designed to capture the concept of tracking the consumer to the electrical network and meter reader. Management Information System reports of every feeder could be generated through appropriate Financial Energy Management System software packages developed to meet specific requires of the circle. Some of the significant features of the software could be as under:

1.         Feeder wise/distribution transformer-wise loss;

2.         Equipment failure and interruption analyses for the feeder;

3.         Billing CGL ( Consumer General Ledger);

4.         Consumer analyses (kWh/kW); and

5.         Realization index (Rs./kWh) for each category and feeder as a whole.

This would enable feeder-wise monitoring of activities and assessment of achievements vis-à-vis targets for loss reduction and revenue realization. You might now like to know: Which software could be used for the above-mentioned purposes?

All energy accounting software have the subsequent features:

a.)     Organization/Site Records such as the name of the site, its address, and related accounts and meters.

b.)     Billing and Climate Records, e.g., total monthly energy consumption and cost based on monthly utility bills for every fuel.

c.)     Reports and Graphs.

d.)    User Friendliness.

e.)    Documentation and Support.

We now present an example of computer software used for energy accounting.