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Huawei helps Indonesia’s state-run utility keep the lights on, while saving customers money
PT PLN Nusantara Power Services Engineering Center
Indonesia's economy grew more than 5% in 2024, fueling a continued rise in electricity consumption and prompting the country’s state-owned electric utility, Perusahaan Listrik Negara (PLN), to focus on innovation and cost efficiency to support its expansion.
Like many other utilities, PLN has embraced digital transformation. One key initiative is the rollout of smart meters that provide real-time data on energy consumption, improving better grid management, load balancing, and customer communication.
Smart meters collect detailed data about energy usage. The data is processed and stored in a Meter Data Management System (MDMS), which powers a user-friendly mobile app for customers.
However, PLN's existing MDMS struggled to handle the growing volume, velocity, and variety of data, risking data corruption, loss, or inaccessibility. Data security and privacy were also critical concerns, requiring a robust storage solution to guard against cyber threats.
To address these challenges, PLN deployed Huawei OceanStor Dorado, a high-performance storage solution that provides faster read/write speeds, while reducing power consumption threefold.
Because PLN has millions of customers, its workflows are massive. Traditional architectures that use a centralized controller to manage data access and storage can only handle a limited quantity of data. As loads increase, there's a real risk that the controller will be overwhelmed. Any downtime would almost certainly disrupt smart meter operations.
OceanStor Dorado makes that outcome highly unlikely. It adopts a symmetric active-active architecture so that its two controllers handle reading, writing, and managing data simultaneously. If one storage fails, the other keeps working without interruption.
This means there is no single point of failure. Everything is always on and sharing the workload, making the system reach to 99.9999% reliability.
This allows PLN to collect accurate data over months, identify usage patterns, and adjust supply to prevent blackouts and reduce peak-time power generation costs. The system also supports PLN's customer-centric goals, enabling users to monitor their energy consumption via the app, make informed decisions, and save money.
To safeguard its data, PLN implemented Huawei OceanProtect for backup and disaster recovery. The solution replicates data across multiple sites, ensuring high availability and resilience.
Given the pervasive threat of ransomware and data leakage, OceanProtect uses an encryption algorithm that protects private information, guarding against data loss or performance issues arising from attacks or natural disasters. Data backups are retained over the long-term through tiered hot and cold data, with one backup site located at PLN's main site in Kebayoran Baru, Jakarta, and another Disaster Recovery (DR) solution about 20km away in Gandul.
With Huawei's technology, PLN has laid a strong foundation for future growth, positioning itself as a regional leader in Indonesia's digital energy transition. By preventing blackouts, reducing costs, and enhancing customer satisfaction, PLN is powering Indonesia toward a brighter future.
