THE deficiencies in ensuring a regulated transmission and distribution that would guarantee profitability and efficiency in the power sector are the key focus of the Smart Metering being initiated by the CWG Plc.
Speaking during the quarterly forum of the Nigeria Information Technology Reporters’ Association (NITRA) in Lagos last week, the Chief Executive Officer of CWG, Mr James Agada, challenged distribution companies (Discos) to toe the path of telecommunications companies that moved from the traditional voice and data services to offering services that border on adverts, data, video streaming and banking services.
He noted that Discos can generate additional revenue from services around media, data, energy consumption, location service and banking.
Agada believes that if Discos can address the issue of revenue generation, infrastructure development will follow and that they can match the generating capacity.
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“The problem is that there is more installed generating capacity than the transmission or grid capacity,” he stated.
Agada explained that the Right of Way (RoW) license could allow Discos offer fibre cabling services, while the poles, towers and distribution points could serve as Microcell Towers, WiFi Hotspots, IoT hubs, and Aggregators.
He further noted that the customer addresses at their disposals could be accessed for a fee for logistic planning while the bill payment history and energy consumption can be used for income prediction and classification and credit scoring.
The company said the Smart Meter will aside from the traditional functions of a metering device, work as a WiFi hotspot and has the capability of transmitting Digital Television signal into homes.
“We can use Value Added Services to solve the energy crisis we are facing today. The meter comes with a mobile application. It is software-controlled and therefore can run as either postpaid or prepaid,” he added.
and then