Entergy Texas finishes rollout of advanced meters in southeast region of state

Entergy Texas wrapped up a years-long project last week in its state’s southeast region, with the announcement that it had concluded deploying advanced meters to homes and businesses.

The upgraded devices offer quicker, more accurate outage detection and energy management, thanks to their connection to a series of online tools. Thanks to this, customers can access their accounts and see how much electricity they have used each day, in as close to real-time as possible: 15-minute increments for residential customers. It will make a notable change, compared to the end of the month waiting game users traditionally faced.

“The new advanced meters not only upgraded our system with new technology that helps us detect outages quicker, but they provide customers with more benefits and control over their energy usage,” Stuart Barrett, vice president of customer service for Entergy Texas, said. “As the heat sets in across southeast Texas, customers can easily access new online tools to manage their energy usage, which can lead to a reduction in their energy usage and potentially help lower their electric bills.”

Beyond energy usage, the meters will allow customers — through their accounts — to anticipate upcoming bills, by providing them with estimates. These estimates can also be compared to bills from previous months and years to offer insights into electricity-affected variables such as days in a billing cycle, energy usage, fuel costs and weather. Customers will also be able to create alerts to keep them within monthly spending goals.