Reading the Electricity Meter

Abstract

The consumers in today's electricity market need to report their electricity consumption usually every third month, and occasionally even more often. The new paradigm in Norway's electricity system will be the use of smart meters that will do all the reporting. The electricity providers will be responsible for the deployment. This is an extensive and costly process. If you want remote electricity measurement today, you need to install an AMS meter priced at NOK 2,500, or find another solution involving an electrician to do the installation, and the costs get high.In this master's thesis, a solution reading the electricity consumption by using a Raspberry Pi and a camera will be described. This solution uses image analysis and object recognition, and retrieves the digits shown on the meter. Finally, it reports the measurement via its Internet connection to a server. The thesis describes the process of developing and implementing the product, and what the product ended up being. In addition, an assessment of the business opportunities of the product is made, including two different business models and product cost estimations.