Method of and system for accumulating verifiable energy demand data from remote electricity meters
First Claim
1. A system for accumulating energy demand data from an electricity meter of a type having means for generating pulses corresponding to a demand rate, comprising:
- a primary power supply;
an auxiliary battery power supply operative to provide power for said system during outages of said primary supply;
low battery circuit means for detecting when the output voltage of said auxiliary battery power supply falls below a predetermined threshold magnitude and for providing a low battery signal;
clock means for maintaining time data corresponding to the current time of day and date; and
memory means for storing time data from said clock means corresponding to the time of day and date at which said low battery circuit means provides said low battery signal.
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Accused Products
Abstract
A solid state electricity demand recorder (10) is controlled by a programmable microprocessor (38) to obtain energy demand survey and billing data. The accumulated count of pulses during a record interval is compared with an encoded register reading obtained from an electricity meter (30) at the end of the record. If there is acceptable correlation between the accumulated count and encoded meter reading, the interval pulse counts associated with that record are deemed verified. Power for the recorder (10) is obtained from the power line, except during power outages in which case a battery (28) provides back-up power. The time of day and date of detection of a low battery condition is stored and used to assess data reliability.
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Citations
13 Claims
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1. A system for accumulating energy demand data from an electricity meter of a type having means for generating pulses corresponding to a demand rate, comprising:
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a primary power supply; an auxiliary battery power supply operative to provide power for said system during outages of said primary supply; low battery circuit means for detecting when the output voltage of said auxiliary battery power supply falls below a predetermined threshold magnitude and for providing a low battery signal; clock means for maintaining time data corresponding to the current time of day and date; and memory means for storing time data from said clock means corresponding to the time of day and date at which said low battery circuit means provides said low battery signal. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6)
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7. A system for accumulating energy demand data from an electricity meter of a type having means for generating pulses corresponding to a demand rate, comprising:
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a primary power supply; an auxiliary battery power supply operative to provide power for said system during outages of said primary power supply; low battery circuit means for detecting when the output voltage of said auxiliary battery power supply falls below a predetermined threshold magnitude and for providing a low battery signal; clock means for maintaining time data corresponding to the current time of day and date; memory means for storing time data corresponding to the time of day and date at which said low battery circuit means provides said low battery signal; means responsive to said low battery signal for transmitting data corresponding to said low battery condition to a central computer over a telephone line; and selectively operable disabling means responsive to render said transmitting means inoperative after transmitting said low battery condition data to said central computer. - View Dependent Claims (8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13)
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Specification