MaltaMedia.com

As from next January, Enemalta’s new accounting system will be functioning and customers (those with the new smart meters and those without) will start receiving new bills with an informative format.

This was announced by Infrastructure Minister Austin Gatt in his opening address at an IBM international workshop about the smartgrid for water and electricity services that IBM will install in Malta.

The project will cost around EUR70 million but Minister Gatt said will be recouped in a few years when, hopefully, loses from the grid will be reduced from 13% to just 4%.

The smart meter being introduced gives the consumer full control on what amount of electricity and when to use it. The consumer can continuously monitor his actual consumption, the Minister said.

From the utilities point of view, this technology enables the corporations to provide intelligent night and day tariffs, issue actual bills (not estimates), issue bonuses for people paying on time, identify electricity patterns and can design payment plans.

All in all the utilities can balance out what electricity to put on the grid.

The consumer can read actual readings continuously, and monitor everything from his computer or PDA.

“All this boils down to transparency,” the minister said.