Surge in demand for Sabiq prepaid electricity meters

MUSCAT, AUG 5 - Muscat Electricity Distribution Company (MEDC), which is responsible for power distribution and supply across Muscat Governorate, has reported a strong uptake of its Sabiq prepaid electricity meter service in the capital region. As many as 10,895 new Sabiq accounts were added during 2016, bolstering the company’s prepaid customer base to around 27,000 accounts, the wholly owned subsidiary of The Nama Group (previously known as The Electricity Holding Company) said in its 2016 Annual Report. MEDC became the first electricity utility in the Sultanate to offer prepaid electricity metering services to consumers when it was rolled out in 2014. Demand for prepaid metering — one of several products offered by the utility to provide hassle-free electricity supply, meter reading, billing and collection services to customers — has been steadily growing over the past three years, according to the company. It now accounts for around eight per cent of the utility’s total customer base of 336,523 accounts by the end of last year. Sabiq customers, says MEDC, are able to exercise complete control over their electricity consumption patterns, enabling them to monitor usage on an hourly, daily or monthly basis. Customers can identify equipment or devices that can help them save electricity by either switching them off or reducing their usage. Further, when operated in conjunction with the Automated Meter Reading (AMR) project of Nama Group — an initiative that helps large industrial, commercial and government customers to benefit from relatively lower non-peak tariffs under the Cost Reflective Tariffs (CRT) scheme introduced earlier this year — it allows them to rationalize their overall power usage. Around 1,000 meters and digital modems for Automated Meter Reading systems were installed at the premises of high-value customers last year, according to Eng Abdullah bin Said al Badri, CEO of MEDC. As one of the largest distribution and supply utilities, based on the size of its customer base, MEDC continues to invest in the expansion and modernization of its electricity networks, the company said in its Annual Report. Based on demand growth trends, MEDC has projected an average six per cent growth in network capacity annually. In 2016, the increase in demand growth was met via capital investments of around RO 51 million, primarily in 33kV and 11kV networks. Despite the overall downturn in the economy, attributable to the constrained global oil price environmental, MEDC recorded sustained progress in 2016, the report said. Around 26,720 new accounts were added to its customer base, which ballooned to 336,523 accounts by the end of 2016 — an increase of 8.6 per cent. Revenue totalled RO 304.7 million last year, generating a net profit of RO 14.606 million for the year, while yielding a Return on Asset (RoA) performance of 9.50 per cent, the report added. Last month, Nama Group shelved plans for the privatization of MEDC pending a review of the methodology for the sale of the government-owned utility — a move that will also likely lay the groundwork for the eventual privatization of other state-owned assets of the Group as well. Conrad Prabhu