A technical and financial analysis of smart prepaid split meters on Eskom's electric power distribution

The implementation of a smart metering system in the distribution network does not only promote energy loss reduction, but also improves smart grids. This improvement in smart grids is achieved by the high level information infrastructure, monitoring, accurate measurement and metering operations that provide a widespread communication substructure. The direct effect of smart prepaid split meters is on energy flow management and billing advancing, to aiding the power quality when combined with a smart grid system. The study focused on the technical and financial effectiveness of the smart prepaid split metering system on the Eskom distribution network. The objectives of the study were, to investigate the severity of non-technical losses in distribution networks before and after smart prepaid split metering roll-out; to investigate the effectiveness of smart prepaid split metering for the utility and customers; to analyze the technical performance on medium voltage (MV) and low voltage (LV) power distribution networks before and after smart prepaid split metering roll-out; and to analyze the effectiveness of smart prepaid split metering for revenue collections. The questionnaire instrumental survey and historical data were used for the analyses. The primary data was obtained from the questionnaire tool. The collected data were analyzed with the Statistical Package for the Social Sciences software (SPSS) version 26.0 and Microsoft Excel 2016 in order to achieve multiobjective decision-making on the effectiveness of smart prepaid split metering in the utility and customer satisfaction. The different inferential statistics techniques used included regressions, correlations, multifactor analysis (MFA), factor analysis (FA) and chi-square test values. These were interpreted using the p-values to identify the change-point, trend and correlated best-fit time series for decision making. This study concluded that the use of a smart prepaid split metering system faces challenges such as a shortage of experts for new smart meter technology to respond to the faults which led to unfavorable results for power system average interruption duration. The study recommended that South Africa’s power utility (Eskom) should consider educating and train more technical officials concerning smart grids and smart metering to ensure that this metering technology, which is still in the early stages of development, functions efficiently