Executive Summary
The primary objective of the Head-End System (HES) is to automatically acquire meter data without human intervention and make it readily available to third-party applications. Additionally, the HES supports bi-directional communication by accepting requests from interfaced applications and relaying them to meters. Throughout its operation, HES ensures comprehensive logging and status tracking.
HES is a scalable data acquisition solution designed for Advanced Metering Infrastructure (AMI). It collects data from smart meters deployed in the field and enables integration with third-party applications such as Meter Data Management (MDM) systems. This enhances business intelligence, operational efficiency, and centralized remote device management across the utility network.
Introduction
Smart meters encompass various types, including single-phase and three-phase meters, such as LTCT and whole current meters. These are deployed across multiple asset types, including feeders, border points, transformers, and consumer premises (industrial, single-phase, and three-phase meters).
The HES is designed to interface with meters from multiple manufacturers, supporting different communication technologies like GPRS and RF. Meter data can be acquired through various methods: on-demand reads, push (configured at the meter), and scheduled pull operations. All acquired data is centralized in a single data repository.
The HES application also offers RESTful APIs to enable real-time data acquisition and seamless integration with other business applications.
Problem Statement
Smart energy meters are sophisticated devices capable of over 50 remote operations and generating various data profiles, including Instantaneous Profile (IP), Load Survey (LS), Credit Balance (CB), Meter Billing (MB), and Event logs. The challenge is to develop an HES capable of managing communication with 18 million smart meters and supporting the following operations:
- Poll Operations: Scheduled or on-demand data retrieval from meters
- Push Operations: Periodic meter data transmission to the HES based on pre-configured parameters
- Push Events: Automated event-based messages sent by meters at regular intervals
Data from different meter profiles is received at variable frequencies—ranging from every 5 minutes to hourly, daily, or monthly—based on configurable schedules. Handling this high-volume, high-velocity data across millions of endpoints necessitates an advanced, cloud-native architecture.
The system must also support a wide range of features for utility stakeholders, including:
- Connectivity & Data Management: Continuous communication with smart meters, with secure storage and access to all HES-managed data
- Integration with MDM Systems: Ability to transmit data to multiple MDM systems and expose REST APIs over HTTPConsumer Management: Support for both prepaid and postpaid consumers, including billing cycle management
- Tariff & Recharge Configuration: Flexible setup for consumer categories, tariffs, and recharge mechanisms
