Nuclear Damage Liability Facilitation Fund (hereinafter, "the Fund") and Tokyo Electric Power Company (hereinafter, "TEPCO"), for the first time as a Japanese electric power company, made an extensive RFC (Request for Comments) aiming at a zero-based review of the specification of smart meters TEPCO plans to introduce, refining it when the need arises. The RFC was twofold, one on the specification of the metering part (from March 13 to April 13), and the other on the basic specification of the communication feature (from March 21 to April 20). As a result, a total of 88 companies, groups, and individuals came back with 482 comments about communication methods, data formats, system expansions, the significance of introducing smart meters, and so forth.
Advisors for the specification of smart meters in Nuclear Damage Liability Facilitation Fund, thoroughly reviewed all the comments received from the RFC. With the help of the feedback, the Fund and TEPCO have come up with a new "basic concept" on the specification of TEPCO smart meters, and would like to share the information with you below.
Potential use cases will be studied for smart meters in the context of future electric power systems in Japan, such as the use of demand response and reuse of meter reading data, as well as remote meter reading and remote disconnect-reconnect features that will be conducive to operational efficiency improvement. With the functional expandability of smart meters more organized, an RFP (Request for Proposal) on the communication feature will be made to finalize a detailed specification.

1. Comments received from the RFC and our responses to them
For details of received comments on the communication feature and TEPCO's responses to them, please visit the following link.

Result of the Request for Comments on the Specification of Smart Meters and Our "Basic Concept"

2. Basic concept for smart meter Specification
Based on the comments received from the RFC, a new "basic concept" on the specification of smart meters has been prepared as shown in the attached sheet.

3. Future plans
In accordance with the "basic concept," the Fund and TEPCO will make a detailed RFP on the communication feature as soon as it can be arranged.
In the meantime, it will take a certain period of time for suppliers, including new entrants, to become familiar with the new specification that derives from the outcome of the RFC. This situation requires us to cancel the bidding originally scheduled for October 2012 (for the smart meter supply starting in FY2013). The bidding will be rescheduled to be ready for the smart meter supply starting in FY2014.

<Attached Sheet>
Basic Concept for Smart Meter Specification based on RFC (PDF 482KB)

<Reference>
Website of Nuclear Damage Liability Facilitation Fund
Proposals from the Advisors in Nuclear Damage Liability Facilitation Fund for TEPCO's smart meter specification

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<Contact for information related to RFC>
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E-mail address : tepcosmartcom@tepco.co.jp
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