Bhubaneswar: In a step to improve services to power consumers, the state government on Saturday launched a new ‘New Electricity Consumer Billing System’.
Along with various customised IT applications, the new system includes setting up of a disaster recovery centre on cloud and IT infra in the offices of three DISCOM divisions in the state.
The state government funded Rs 117 crore and the Centre about Rs 42 crore under the integrated power development scheme (IPDS) for developing and rolling out the new system.
It will bring about digital transformation in providing various services to electricity consumers and lead to a real time inventory of the materials and resources available in different divisions so that those could be transported to other divisions as per the requirement.
Launching the new system at Lokseva Bhawan, here, chief secretary Suresh Chandra Mahapatra said, “The new system is future ready. It will provide for smart meter reading, smart grid, pre-paid regime and correct accounting of renewable energy generated from roof top solar etc.”
Principal secretary, Energy NB Dhal said, “The new system will improve the power services to around 73 lakh consumers in the state with quick power connection, advanced metering, error free billing and collection, dedicated customer care center, a centralised help desk, and, a state-of-the-art data centre at OPTCL”.
The system also envisions reducing the aggregate technical and commercial (A&T) loss from the present 30% to 15% at the rate of 2 to 3 per cent per annum. The project is being implemented by OPTCL with Fluentgrid and the System Integrator and Bosch India (RBEI) as SAP ERP delivery partner.
Development Commissioner Pradeep Kumar Jena, Principal Secretary Finance Vishal Dev, OPTCL MD Sanjay Mishra, MD GRIDCO Trilochan Panda, Director OPTCL Bhadresh Bhai Mehetta and general manager Priyadarshan Patra along with senior officers of the DISCOMs were present on the occasion.