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Portsmouth Water is seeking delivery partners to assist with the company’s smart meter rollout.
Divided into two lots, the combined value of the contract is worth £136.5 million over a five year period.
The first lot covers infrastructure works including water mains renewals and replacement, new water mains, service pipes and connections, water mains extensions and diversions, water mains repair and general infrastructure maintenance.
The first lot also includes “ad hoc” smart water meter installations.
The second lot is solely focussed on the rollout of smart meters and the delivery partner will be required to carry out installations and commissioning, including deployment planning, delivery and strategic planning.
A Portsmouth Water spokesperson said: “The universal metering programme will rollout cutting-edge smart meter technology that will deliver operational efficiency, improve customer service, and promote water conservation for the Portsmouth Water area of supply; a region classified as an area of ʻserious water stressʼ by The Environment Agency in 2021.”
Suppliers looking to bid for the contract will need to do so by 17 June.
Earlier this year, Portsmouth Water announced that it expects to install a smart meter in all of its customers’ properties within eight years.
Portsmouth’s plan for PR24 proposed £75 million of expenditure on smart metering between 2025-30 and £10 million to reduce leakage by 16%.
Some £7 million was proposed to upgrade IT systems to become the first fully smart company. Utility Week previously revealed the company’s adoption of the Kraken operating system to facilitate the ambition.
The smart network scheme is based on a pilot from 2021, which was designed to drive per capita consumption down by 20-30 litres daily.
Meter penetration has remained relatively low in Portsmouth’s region. The company attributed this to billpayers not seeing the financial benefits associated with a meter because it already has the lowest charges in the country.
At 160 litres PCC, Portsmouth’s customers are at the higher end of consumption and above the average of 145 litres.
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