KERC Extends Deadline For Installation of AMR Meters

The Karnataka Electricity Regulatory Commission (KERC) has now ordered an extension of the deadline for the mandatory installation of Automatic Meter Reading (AMR) meters for eligible power entities. It comes after the discoms made a demand for the same.

However, the KERC expressed its displeasure over the slow deployment of AMR Meters in the state despite the Commission insisting on compliance on the issue. 

The Commission earlier clarified that the Open Access (OA), High Tension (HT), and Extremely High Tension (EHT)  power connections must have these AMR Meters. The KERC, in its latest order, has extended the deadline to September 30 this year. Earlier, the deadline was set to expand on August 1, 2023. 

“The Commission hereby decides to further extend the time for installation of AMR meters including communication facilities to all the OA/HT/EHT consumers, generator-transmission interface points (bulk meters) and generators upto September 30, 2023. The Commission further directs that whatever AMR-compatible meters are already installed , the bill for such transactions should be automated without waiting for an extended date and manual intervention for reading the data shall be completely stopped in such cases. In case of non-compliance of the order, the Commission would initiate action under Section 142 of the Electricity Act, 2003,” the order said. 

Earlier, the Commission had ruled that the accounting and billing of power connections for such categories should be done based on AMR data from April 1, 2023. The KERC had also said that defiance of the order could lead to legal action. It later delayed the deadline from April 1 to August 1, 2023. 

The KERC said that during a meeting of the Commission with KPTCL, SLDC and ESCOMs of the state, the SLDC submitted that out if the 575 bulk meters, 418 bulk meters were integrated with AMR facilities and balance 157 meters were yet to be integrated. It also said that out of the 986 generators only 167 generators had installed AMR meters. The ESCOMS meanwhile sought additional two to three months of time for installation of AMR meters.