Spatial Informatics and Geographical Information Systems: Development of Power Theft Monitoring System

Abstract

Utility companies estimate that electricity theft costs them billions of dollars in annual revenues loss all over the world. In Pakistan electricity theft is a major problem and utilities companies report over 35 percent loss in revenue annually. Traditional methods were not very fruitful and could not stop electricity pilferage in the country. To deal with this problem a study was designed to use modem technologies like Geographic Information System (GIS) for the prevention of electricity pilferage. The main objectives of the study were to a) generate geometric network, b) develop user interface, suspected consumer detection and c) develop raster surfaces of suspected areas. To achieve the objectives of the study a standalone application using C# .Net environment and software development kit of ESRI arc objects was developed to identify the suspected regions in study area. To identify the suspected tolerance weights, on the basis of adopted criteria, were calculated automatically for whole feeder. Calculated weights were stored in personal gee-database where relationships were built between entities of database. These relationships helped to generate surface maps that describe the percentage of suspected area and also identify the consumers. The stand alone system developed to check the electricity pilferage was validated in a case study. This system supports the concerned authorities to achieve a higher level of effectiveness of their decision making ability while dealing with the semi-structured spatial problem of detecting the power theft.