The bid for prepaid smart meters, worth Rs 23,000 crore in UP by the giant corporate firms
Several Indian corporate firms such as the Adani Group, GMR Group, L&T, and IntelliSmart have submitted their bids for tenders floats by the four power distribution companies in Uttar Pradesh. They have bid for the installation of about 2.84 crores of prepaid “smart meters” across the state. The news has been shared by an industry insider who was aware of the developments.
The cumulative estimated value of the tenders was found to be 23,000 crore INR. The last date for the submission of bids was found to be 17 October 2022.
The tenders are part of an overall all-India push to upgrade and improve the power distribution network in India. They were involved in a scheme that was launched by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who launched the Revamped Distribution Sector Scheme (RDSS) on 30 July 2022.
The RDSS is a reforms-based and results-linked scheme with a total outlay of 3,03,758 crore INR over five years from FY 021-22 to 2025-26 which has been stated by the Ministry of Power. The main objective is to improve the quality, reliability, and affordability of power supply to consumers through a financially sustainable and operationally-efficient distribution sector.
The Centre plans to replace twenty-five crore traditional meters across India with smart meters under the scheme. It includes the efforts of Phase 1 for replacing the 10 crore meters in areas where the discoms are practising extreme losses and where there are high-value customers by December 2023.
The problem will be addressed in the remaining areas by the end of 2025.
In Uttar Pradesh, Dakshinachal Vidyut Vitran Nigam (DVVNL), Purvanchal Vidyut Vitaran Nigam (PuVVNL) Paschim Himachal Vidyut Vitaran Nigam (PVVNL), and Madhyanchal Vidyut Vitaran Nigam (MVVNL) have floated tenders.
DVVNL floated a tender for installing 79.16 lakh smart meters at an approximate cost of 4576.11 crores INR. on the other hand, PuVVNL for 77.5 lakh smart meters for 7452.67 crore INR.
PVVNL floated a tender for 66.84 lakh smart meters for 5517.77 crore INR, and MVVNL floated a tender of 61.73 lakh smart meters at an estimated cost of 5454.86 crores.
The work involves the installation of smart meters and other systems followed by managing the meter data, cloud services, communications, and billing systems.
The industry official has reported that the Adani Group, GMR Group, and L&T have submitted bids for all the tenders. However, Intellismart has extended bids for PVVNL and MVVNL.
Adani Transmission has recently announced that the company has won a bid for a tender by the Brihanmumbai Electric Supply and Transport (BEST) to install 10.8 lakh smart meters and related communications and cloud infrastructure in Mumbai for the next 30 months.
The highest number of smart meters have been installed in Uttar Pradesh
As part of the national rollout plans, around 50 lakh meters have been installed across several states so far. The highest number of meters have been installed in Uttar Pradesh followed by Bihar, Rajasthan, Haryana, Assam, Delhi, Madhya Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, and Jammu and Kashmir.
Uttar Pradesh has a considerably large population density than other parts of India.
This implies that despite the state having installed the highest number of smart meters in the country so far, which comprises 11.5 lakh. It still falls behind in terms of the percentage of meters covered.
Bihar has taken the lead in the smart metering process and has already replaced 92 percent of the traditional meters with smart prepaid meters. The smart meter rollout has shown phenomenal results for 11 lakh meters.
The installation of the smart meters has resulted in 100 percent recovery of arrears in areas with high penetration of the smart meters. The rollout of the smart metering process is excellent in Jammu and Kashmir.
edited and proofread by nikita sharma
