Design and development of an innovative smart metering
system with GUI-based NTL detection platform
K.K. Kee1, S. M.F. Shahab2and C.J. Loh3
13
School of Engineering & Technology, University College of Technology Sarawak,
1
kkkee@ucts.edu.my, 3davlll@hotmail.com
2
Electrical Inspectorate Unit, Ministry of Public Utilities Sarawak, 2mohamfs1@sarawak.gov.my
Keywords: NTL detection, smart metering, smart grid,
GUI, electricity theft
Abstract
Smart Grid is gradually adopted by most of the
countries. AMI (Advanced Metering Infrastructure) is
one of the key enabler technologies which consists of
smart meters, communication network and MDMS
(Meter Data Management System). The timely
information, for example consumption data and event
logs are important for detection of NTL (non-technical
loss) such as electricity theft and other customer
malfeasance. It contributes up to 40% of revenue loss
of utility companies in some countries throughout the
world. The proposed detection mechanisms include
energy balance method, smart meters in AMI, physical
detection sensors and the AI (artificial intelligence)
methods namely fuzzy logic and SVM (support vector
machine). The problematic issue is that those
mechanisms are merely implemented separately with
dissatisfaction outcomes due to inherent limitations and
weaknesses. In this paper, a novel design of smart
metering system is developed as GUI-based NTL
detection platform. A 3-tier design of detection
algorithm is proposed to combine three mechanisms to
complement each other for enhanced performance. The
triangulation technique facilitates validation of
detection result through cross verification from three
sources of measurement data. Furthermore, the system
also support better flexibility with built-in or external
developed AI methods and user-friendly GUI-based
platform to monitor and analyse NTL status in real time
of power grid for revenue recovery.
1 Introduction
The advanced and intelligent smart grid offers bi-
directional flow of electricity and information with
greater responsive to consumer load and demand,
DERs (distributed energy resources), power
interruption management and NTL (non-technical
losses) detection. The observation ability of entire grid
with IEC-61850 standard enables those integrated
controllers to instantly communicate with each
substation and energy conversion units such as
transformers, converters, inverters and generators for
substation automation purpose. Detection of source and
load side demands to manage the energy flow in an
extended decision circumstances [1,2].
To support the smart grid to monitor and manage the
DERs and load demand, the AMI (Advanced Metering
Infrastructure) is employed to collect the timely data
and information from the consumer ends. The bi-
directional flow of information and control signal
between utility company and consumer ends may use
wired or/and wireless networks. AMI typically includes
the smart meter, communication network via hybrid
networks with different level of infrastructure
hierarchy, and MDMS (Meter Data Management
System). The timely data from the smart meters are
used for various purposes such as billing, load pattern
analysis for electricity theft detection, management of
peak demand, monitoring and controlling of usage
profile and pattern of consumers, and remote operation
of supply (disconnect and re-connection) of electricity
at the consumer ends.
1.1 Non-technical loss (NTL)
The electrical losses happen during generation,
transmission and distribution of electricity throughout
the power grid can be classified into TL (technical
losses) and NTL (non-technical losses). TL is relatively
easier to analyse and calculate, whereas the NTL is
more difficult to detect and measure accurately. NTL
refers to illegal consumption of electricity such as
electricity theft and other customer malfeasances. It
may contribute up to 40% loss of total energy generated
in both developing countries and even developed
countries. It is estimated that utility companies
worldwide suffer a sum of revenue loss more than
US$25 billion yearly due to NTL. Among the countries
include India with US$ 4.5 billion [3], US$ 6.0 billion
for USA [4]. Peninsular Malaysia has reported a
revenue loss ranging from RM150 to RM500 million
between 2010 and 2011 [5,6] whereas SEB (Sarawak
Energy Berhad) from Sarawak has remarked RM150
million loss in 2010 but recorded RM43 million loss in
2014 [7,8].
1.2 NTL detection mechanisms
NTL includes many methods of stealing electricity
namely the tapping of electricity directly from the
distribution feeder, tampering of energy meter or
bypassing, using physical methods to fraud the
metering and bill payment [9,10]. It is found that the
meter tampering happened in both electromechanical
meter and smart meters. Furthermore, there are
numerous sophisticated ways of stealing electricity
namely tampering of CT secondary side of energy
meter, internal calibration of energy meter and
grounding of neutral line at consumer end [10].
In order to counteract the revenue loss due to NTL,
many researchers and utility companies have proposed
and implemented various mechanisms or strategies to
detect NTL. M. Anas et al. has discussed many issues
related to minimization of electricity theft by the use of
smart meter in AMI [11]. A simple energy balance
method is defined by the law of physics which utilises
phase current readings measured at the distribution
transformer feeder LV (low voltage) line and all the
electrically connected consumer ends. Those phase
current readings are compared to estimate the total
electricity being lost at the distribution end [12]. E-
metering system was implemented to analyse
consumption data and used to detect abnormalities in
load profiles for the purpose of electricity theft
identification [13]. Other researchers have also
proposed the AI (artificial intelligence) methods based
on consumption data namely genetic algorithm – SVM
(support vector machine) with the detection hit-rate up
to 60% was achieved [14,15,16].
To counteract the problems of physical meter
tampering, various sensors are utilised to gauge the
physical condition of smart meter such as illegal
attempts of opening the enclosures, de-energise of
meter and power outages. The event logs can be
recorded for alerting and inspection by the utility
companies. A proposed technique was the use of
remote meters installed at premises of LPC (large
power consumer) by the correlation of the half-hourly
recorded load profile with abnormal meter events for
NTL detection with hitrate of 55% [17]. Another SVM-
based classification technique was proposed to use the
correlation of consumption data and power loss area of
the distribution area [18].
1.3 Problem statement
Though many algorithms proposed to analyse and
detect NTL, they are merely implemented separately
with dissatisfaction outcomes due to inherent
limitations and weaknesses of respective mechanisms.
For example, the method of comparison of phase
current readings at transformer feeder and consumer
ends is potentially good to detect the clusters or areas
but without any identification of “malicious” electricity
theft individually. Many proposed AI methods are still
at developing stage and subject to the constraints of low
detection hit-rate and time consuming of data mining
and computation.
In this paper, a novel design of smart metering system
is developed to integrate smart meters, communication
network and MDMS into a GUI (graphical user
interface) based NTL detection platform. An algorithm
of NTL detection is proposed to combine several
detection mechanisms which complement each other
for enhanced performance. The operators utilise the
platform to analyse and identify the suspected
electricity theft cases by using the information received
from the smart meters and stored data in database.
Furthermore, the proposed smart metering system also
assists the utility companies to automatically acquire
real time electricity consumption data, power quality
measurement, event logging and remote supply
disconnection / re-connection. The remaining of the
paper is organised as follows. In the next section, the
details of the design and implementation of the
proposed smart meter system is presented. In section 3
the results are presented and discussed. The paper then
concludes making recommendations for future work
that needs to be carried out.
2. Hardware and architectural design
2.1 Overall architecture design
The overall architecture of the proposed smart metering
system as illustrated in Fig 1 which consists of the
directional flows of both electrical power and
information within the power grid. The electrical power
flows within the network of generation, transmission
and distribution whereby the distribution transformers
are used to transform MV (medium voltage) to LV (low
voltage) before electrically connected to the consumer
ends (or the smart meters). They are connected to LV
lines in bus topology.
 Fig 1: Architecture of the proposed smart metering system

It is bi-directional flow of real-time information (data controlling, remote supply disconnection and re-
and control signals) within the power grid whereby the connection, displaying of consumption profile for
smart meters are connected to the end customers better load management etc. Five main internal
through home area network HAN. The smart meters, modules of a smart meter design are power supply,
CNTR (concentrator) and DAU (Data Aggregator Unit) microcontroller MCU, communication interface,
act as the networked devices to perform M2M measurement and data acquisition DAQ, and remote
(Machine-to-Machine) communication without further control module as illustrated in Fig 2.
human intervention. The system enables real-time
exchange of information between the customer ends
and generation facilities for monitoring and controlling
purpose. The real time information is then relayed to
MDMS for storage and analytical work of electricity
theft detection.

The smart meters communication through the

concentrator represents the basic configuration of the
architecture network. It is particularly used for urban or
semi-urban scenarios with LV network. The CNTRs
are located at the IEC-61850 compliant transformer
feeders which monitor electrical power parameters
through each LV line. They are used to aggregate the
data traffic from the smart meters and electrical
parameters from the feeders for communications with
the MDMS. Each CNTR is exclusively dedicated to be
responsible to one NAN (neighbourhood area network)
which consists of a number of customers with the
connected smart meters. Fig 2: The hardware design of smart meter unit

2.2 Smart Meter Unit
The smart meter unit is used to generate timely data
(consumption and information) which relays back to
MDMS for storage and monitoring. It has other
functionalities such as communication with HAN
(home area network) for load scheduling and
The power supply module has built-in switched mode
power supply and battery backup with charger to ensure
that the unit remains powered even when the main line
is disabled. The microcontroller MCU has built-in
ADC (Analog-to-Digital Converter) to digitise the
acquired measurement data (consumption data, power
quality and event logs) from DAQ unit. The authors
have proposed the use of low-cost non-invasive YHDC
SCT-013-000 AC Current Sensor Transformer as
shown in Fig 3, to measure the phase current, energy
consumption kWh and other parameters.
Fig 3: YHDC SCT-013-000 AC Current Sensor
Transformer
Each installed smart meter at the consumer end has a
unique meter ID. The communication interface module
provides both wired and wireless communication of the
meter to interact with the rest of the grid. The Nordic
NRF24L01 RF Transceiver IC as shown in Fig 4, is
used for wireless communication between the smart
meter and concentrator due to low-cost and ultra-low
power features. The smart meter also has a built-in RTC
(real-time clock) which may drift as much as 60
minutes/year. Due to connection to the main network,
it is periodically re-synchronised with the master clock.
The remote supply disconnection and re-connection
module is responsible to remotely control the
connection of metering supply to the customer end by
the utility company due to specific reasons such as late
payment of electricity bill or disconnection of service.
Fig 4: Nordic nRF24L01 transceiver module
2.3 Concentrator and data aggregator unit
(DAU)
The hardware architecture designs for both
concentrator and DAU are similar as shown in Fig 5.
They perform as networked device to relay information
(data and control signals) within the communication
network. The hardware consists of four main modules
i.e. (it) MCU (microcontroller) (ii) power measurement
(iii) power supply and (iv) communication interface
module.
Fig 5: The architectural design of the concentrator or
data aggregator unit DAU
The power measurement unit is used to acquire the
electrical data of LV side of the distribution transformer
feeder such as phase current, voltage and other
parameters. The collected data is then relayed back to
MDMS through wired or wireless network for further
analytical works, for example, power quality
monitoring and improvement, detection of non-
technical losses such as electricity theft and other
purposes.
2.4 NTL Detection Framework
In order to facilitate an effective NTL detection
platform, the authors have proposed an algorithm of
NTL detection which combines three detection
mechanisms to complement each other for enhanced
performance.
The proposed 3-tier design of detection framework
integrates three different mechanisms such that the
detection hit-rate can be theoretically increased while
reducing the computation time and load. In fact, the
newly proposed algorithm is based on the triangulation
technique which facilitates validation of data through
cross verification from three sources of convergence
measurement data for better validity of detection result.
 Fig 6: The flow chart of 3-tier NTL detection framework design

The flow chart of the proposed NTL detection three-phase AC 415V or industrial use with minimal
framework is illustrated in Fig 6 and explained as modification of hardware design. The concentrator /
follows. DAU unit is constantly communicate with the Smart
Meters for relaying of consumption data of customer
(1) Detection of the NTL status of the clusters or ends.
areas by using the comparison of phase currents
at both transformer feeder and LV lines
connected to the smart meters. Once abnormality
is found, the cluster or area will be tagged.
(2) Applying the built-in AI-method of detection to
analyse consumption load profile of the users
within the tagged cluster or area found from step
(1). The consumption data of users from the
specific tagged cluster can also be exported as
.csv format file for further analysis by other AI
detection algorithms which are externally
developed by the academia or consultants. Once
abnormality is found, the customer ID will be
tagged.
(3) Correlation of the result of tagged customer IDs
found from step (2) with the event logs in
database. Once abnormality is found, the user ID
will be identified as “suspected” customer ID in
the list for the enforcement team to take further Fig 7: Overall structure layout of smart meter system
action.
3.1 Graphical User Interface (GUI) Design and
3. System Testing and Results Evaluation
As a proof of concept, a working model of the proposed The graphical panel of NTL detection as shown in Fig
smart metering system is developed which consists the 8 is designed for Windows-based computer and tested
smart meters, concentrator and GUI application using the Microsoft Visual Studio development suite.
software with MDMS. The overall hardware layout of The main purpose of GUI software is to provide a user-
smart metering system is illustrated in Fig 7. friendly graphical platform for the operators to perform
monitoring and analysis of power grid and NTL
For demonstration purpose, single-phase AC 240V of detection. The software displays energy consumption
domestic use is considered to illustrate the operational data in real time or archived data for visualisation and
procedure of smart metering system in NTL detection. also able to remotely connect or disconnect the supply
Nevertheless, the same principle can be applied for of customer end without any physical operation on site
by the operators. The half-hourly received data (energy
consumption and event logs) will be stored in MySQL
database server through Internet. The consumption data
can be retrieved for visualisation and analysis or
exported as .csv file for external verification by other
AI-based NTL detection software.
Fig 8: The graphical panel of GUI for NTL detection
3.2 General page of GUI program
The general page of GUI program illustrates the
connection to the smart meters at the consumer ends
which the information (consumption data and control
signals) is relayed bi-directionally within the
communication networks. The real time consumption
data (kWh, current and voltage) are displayed and
remote supply connection or re-connection can be
accomplished by the operators on the general page of
GUI program as illustrated in Fig 9.
Fig 9: The main page of GUI detection platform
3.3 Real time chart plotting of energy
consumption
The real time chart plotting of energy consumption in
bar chart is illustrated in Fig 10. The feature allows the
operator to monitor and analyse the energy
consumption of households based on the collected data
from the smart meters.
Fig 10: Real time chart plotting of energy
consumption
3.4 The Proposed Detection Algorithm of
NTLs
The following steps are performed to demonstrate the
working principle of NTL detection algorithm as
proposed.
Step 1: Comparison of phase current
The operator selects the specific date of inspection to
retrieve the phase current data of transformer feeder and
the associated smart meters at the consumer ends. The
listed analytical data has shown that ClusterID with
100123 has 3 clients with the connected smart meters
as shown in Fig 11.
Fig 11: Comparison of phase current data
The readings of phase current shown 65.8% of
deviation and it is tagged as “HIGH” for NTL status. It
implies that the tagged cluster has high possibility of
NTL which the electricity theft may possibly exist.
Step 2: Apply AI-method of NTL detection
Once the tagged ClusterID has been identified, the
energy consumption data of each customer within the
tagged cluster will be used for NTL detection. The
operator can select either the built-in or external
developed artificial intelligent (AI) method of NTL
detection as shown in Fig 12. The output shows the list
of connected customers within the tagged cluster.
According to the results, the CustomerID with 200103
has identified and tagged as “HIGH” for NTL status
with high possibility of NTL may exist.
Fig 12: Applying AI-method of NTL detection
Step 3: Correlation of result with event logs
For verification reason, the tagged CustomerID result
from Step 2 will be correlation with the event logs
stored in database. Once the tagged CustomerID has
been confirmed, the customer will be put in the list of
“suspected” CustomerID for the enforcement team to
take further action.
4. Conclusion
NTL remains as a problematic issue of utility
companies in most of the countries. It has been shown
that NTL may cause revenue loss up to 40% of total
energy generated in some countries. This paper
presents a novel design of smart metering system with
user-friendly GUI-based detection platform for NTL.
The authors have proposed a 3-tier design of detection
algorithm by integration of three different detection
mechanisms into one operational platform. The
triangulation technique is applied to facilitate
validation of detection result through cross verification
from three convergence of measurement data for better
validity. It is conceptually expected that the detection
hit-rate will be increased while reducing the
computation time of AI-based detection mechanism. As
a proof of concept, a prototype of working model is
developed to demonstrate its functionalities.
With implementation of the proposed system, the utility
company will gain benefit of revenue recovery from the
NTL by utilizing the user-friendly and flexibility GUI-
based detection platform to monitor and analyse NTL
status in real time with the support of externally
developed AI-method of detection algorithms. As
future improvement, the developed system will be
tested with actual smart meter data of consumers from
a pilot project site. For performance analysis purpose,
the system will be evaluated and assessed by using the
selected AI methods of NTL detection for efficiency
and hit-rate comparison for different scenario cases.
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to thank Electrical Inspectorate
Unit (EIU), Ministry of Public Utilities Sarawak for the
technical advice and recommendations on project
design and the contribution of statistical data.
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