Update on water meter replacement project
The City of Kingsport has a number of developments to announce in connection to a $4.8 million water meter replacement project.
- Customers are now on a 30-day billing cycle and the city is continuing to work towards returning all customers to their normal, approximate due date.
- More than 17,000 new water meters have been installed to date, which allows the city to obtain readings remotely. The remaining meters are being read manually each month.
- A base station and nine repeaters have been installed across the water system to receive the usage information from the new water meters.
- 5,000 new water meters have recently been delivered to the city and another 5,000 are expected to arrive in January.
- Kingsport plans to go out to bid for the installation of 10,000 new water meters in October. All of these meters are scheduled to be installed by June 30, 2023.
The water meter replacement project dates back to December 2020, when the batteries in some water meters started to fail earlier than anticipated. As a result, the city’s utilities department was not able to electronically detect an accurate reading of water usage.
In response, the city began replacing these water meters with new ones in the spring of 2021. Kingsport anticipates having all remaining water meters in its 39,000-count system replaced with new ones within the next couple of years.
If you have any further questions about your water bill, please call 423-343-9860.
