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Ames awards $3.9M AMI contract to Clara Technologies to accelerate meter changeout
Summary
The City awarded a contract to Clara Technologies for an advanced metering infrastructure (AMI) system, including a near-term pilot and an accelerated two-year meter changeout to provide near real-time electric and water meter reads and future load-management capability.
The Ames City Council approved a contract award to Clara Technologies for the city's advanced metering infrastructure (AMI) project, which staff said will include a pilot phase followed by an accelerated meter changeout.
Utilities staff described a three-phase rollout: a pilot immediately followed by a two-year accelerated meter replacement campaign to install AMI-capable electric and (selected) water meters; a third phase (funded later) will add load-management switches to enable demand-side management options.
Public and council questions focused on cost, vendor-dependence and expected operational savings. Utilities staff said the selected meters and network use widely supported industry standards and that a consultant advised the city on technology selection to avoid being locked into a single proprietary meter type. Staff said a hosted-service annual fee (beginning after year two) will be part of the operating budget; they estimated an annual hosted-service cost of about $390,000 starting in year two to cover the data platform, customer portal and related services.
Why it matters: City staff said AMI will reduce the need for manual reads and provide near-real-time data to help manage feeder loads, better detect outages and enable potential time-of-use pricing and demand-response programs. Staff also said that better load visibility could reduce future capacity investments by smoothing peak demand with price signals or load-control programs.
Council action: The council awarded the contract to Clara Technologies and approved funding for phases one and two (pilot and two-year meter changeout). Staff said the chosen option will shorten the multi-year manual-changeout timeline to about two years, enabling faster realization of system benefits.
What happens next: Staff will begin the pilot, install communication infrastructure (mesh network radios and towers) and then proceed with the accelerated meter changeout. The hosted-service fee will be built into subsequent utility operating budgets after the initial rollout.
