Tatu City selects Landis+Gyr and Honeywell for smart utilities infrastructure

Tatu Connect, the utilities company at Tatu City, is improving the efficiency of power usage and quality of service to consumers by investing in Advanced Metering Infrastructure (AMI), which allows smart metering devices to be operated remotely.

In AMI, reliable communications between the smart meters and the software platform is a key requirement where even a very small percentage of missing data reads can impact both the operator and the customer. To improve the customer experience, Tatu City uses ecWIN™, the utilities metering services platform by Energy Insight, a company with more than 30 years’ experience in automated and advanced metering infrastructure in Africa. A multi-vendor platform, ecWIN™ can be fully integrated with existing enterprise business and e-payment systems.

Following six months of evaluation with Energy Insight, Tatu Connect selected Honeywell and Landis+Gyr, both global leaders in smart metering technologies. These will be used in different applications across industrial, commercial and domestic metering in Tatu City.

Honeywell AS1700 Industrial meters have been deployed for businesses at Tatu Industrial Pak. These robust technology meters offer outstanding measurement and complex tariff capabilities with CT and CT/VT operated applications for the larger power users at higher voltages and communicate through robust GPRS capability to ecWIN™.

For the commercial and domestic smart metering at Tatu City, Landis+Gyr was selected due to its advanced smart meter technology and G3-PLC (Power Line Communication technology) capability, which is considered a quantum leap in AMI smart meter communications.

The Landis+Gyr DC450 G3 PLC data collector is placed at each mini substation and communicates at high speed using existing electricity grid wires to Landis+Gyr E460G3PLC smart meters that are installed at each of the commercial or domestic premises. Each DC450 G3 data collector installed can communicate bi-directionally, pairing with over 300 smart electrical and water meters and seamlessly with the AMI software platform ecWIN™.

By using the existing electricity network and PLC technology to communicate metering data from both water and electricity smart meters, there is a reduced cost of rolling out smart metering infrastructure at Tatu City.

Roger Rebelo, Head of Utilities & Urban Services, said, “Advanced Metering Infrastructure and smart meter rollouts like Tatu City are highly complex projects which impact utility operations and revenue assurance extensively. It is therefore important that a holistic approach is used where AMI is built around a versatile software platform like ecWIN™ and supported with best in class advanced smart metering, cost effective communication technology with fast connectivity and high data security.”

In Kenya and East Africa, Energy Insight is represented by Nextec Industrial Technologies Kenya Ltd.