Elster Integrated Solutions (EIS), part of Elster Group, announced recently that Entergy has selected Elster's EnergyAxis advanced metering infrastructure (AMI) solution for its 3,400 meter pilot in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Entergy delivers electricity to 2.6 million utility customers in Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi and Texas. Entergy will use the pilot to test AMI functionality, identify functional benefits, and subsequently develop a long term strategy for deploying AMI.

EnergyAxis provides Entergy with full AMI functionality including:

- Very high system read and communications reliability
- Delivery of monthly and on-demand reads
- Ability to collect interval data from every meter
- Real time remote meter connect and disconnect with load-limiting functionality
- Outage detection and notification
- Remotely upgradeable firmware
- Pre-pay account management
- Home area network including displays, thermostat, and load controls utilizing ZigBee® communications

Sharon Allan, president of Elster Integrated Solutions said, "We are pleased and proud of the selection of EnergyAxis as the platform to validate Entergy's long-term AMI strategy. We are committed to providing the products and services that have made the EnergyAxis System the number one worldwide AMI mesh network."

The EnergyAxis System is currently the most widely deployed two-way mesh network AMI technology in the world. Its standards-based open architecture offers utilities a full range of AMI functionality choices and seamless integration with customer enterprise or meter data management (MDM) packages.

Wed Dec 19 14:42:00 CST 2007