Mysuru first to get ‘Smart Grid’: A pilot project instigated by DK Shivakumar

Mysuru, the city of palaces becomes the first in the country to be equipped with a ‘Smart Grid’. A pilot project by Energy Minister DK Shivakumar. Read more below…

Smart Grid is a fully automated system to monitor the distribution of electricity to individual customers and to facilitate uninterrupted distribution of power, reduce load shedding and to check theft of electricity across Mysuru.

Total 14 states including Karnataka, was chosen for the Smart Grid pilot project. However, CHESCOM (Chamundeshwari Electricity Corporation Ltd) is the first in the country to successfully implement the project in December 2016. Mysuru is the first city in India to have implemented the Smart Grid project under the PPP model at a cost of nearly Rs 32.59 crore. As of now, it covers 24,532 consumers in the city.

 The project was instigated and implemented by Energy Minister DK Shivakumar through PPP model in association with Enzen Global Solution Private Ltd.

Mysore Smart Grid pilot project area

Smart Grid was taken up at the cost of Rs. 32.56  crores say reports. The project involves 24,532 consumers with a good mix of residential, commercial, industrial and agricultural consumers including 512 irrigation pump sets covering over 14 feeders and 473 distribution transformers and accounting for input energy of 151.89 MU.

As per the project, smart meters have been installed at each household at the cost of over Rs 10,000 (per household) and they are being monitored at centralized monitoring unit at CHESCOM office in Vijayanagar.

However, additional functionality like Agriculture DSM with community portal, consumer portal to support DSM/DR, employee portal for knowledge sharing and benefit realization are also been implemented in the Smart Grid pilot project.

The project has so far been implemented on a limited scale in Mysuru to ensure better power supply-demand management by the Chamundeswari Electricity  Supply Company (CESC), and it will also be expanded across the city in view of its success and enhanced power savings.

Advantages of Smart Grid project

•    It omits the human errors.

•    Reduces manpower and improves quicker billing

•    Increases the resiliency of the grid.

•    Helps in the implementation of Dynamic traffic.

•    Helps to catch power theft directly from the power lines.

•    Helps to catch tampering of Energy Meters.

The Smart Grid would be expanded to bring in all four lakh CESC consumers in the city within its ambit and is expected to cost around Rs. 400 crores. It has evoked nation-wide appreciation. Technical experts from other parts of the country have also evinced an interest in its functioning. Thanks to Energy Minister DK Shivakumar for his endless efforts in laying the foundation step in ‘Smart Grid’ for Mysuru.