The system at a glance
Liberty is a metering and payment system for community heating in district and communal schemes of any size. Each property has a Liberty Connect 200 hub, wired to its utility meters, and a Pipit 200 in home display. Both talk to Liberty Online, which operators use to manage every property in a scheme from one place.
How it works
- The Liberty Connect 200 is wall mounted in the property. It connects by wire over MBus to up to three utility meters, covering heat, cooling, hot water and potable water.
- It collects consumption data and processes it against the tenant's account, in either prepayment or credit mode.
- It sends data to Liberty Online and receives commands over a cellular connection (NB IoT and CAT M1) using its own SIM. No wired network is needed between properties.
- It talks wirelessly to the Pipit 200, which shows the tenant their balance and usage and lets them keep control of their costs.
- When a tenant tops up, the credit is applied in real time. If balance runs out, the hub's internal relay can disconnect the supply.
What it means for each user
Operators
- Real time data in Liberty Online, including balances, kWh readings, credit added, consumption costs, standing charges, and temperature differential and volume.
- Email alerts for tampering, faults, unauthorised vend codes, exhausted credit, unauthenticated access attempts, heat meter configuration changes and communication failures.
- Remote switching between prepayment and credit mode, plus debt management options.
- Remote management and updates, with no long term contracts.
Tenants
- A clear in home display of balance and usage in colour.
- A choice of ways to top up: cash, retail outlets, website, phone and text.
Installers and support teams
- Guided on screen commissioning, including the checks for valve, flow, signal and WAN connection.
- Pairing the Pipit 200 needs only the installation code from its back.
- Result codes on screen show which commissioning step failed, so faults can be diagnosed on site.
- Suitable for new build and retrofit projects.
Reliability and security
- Each property works independently, so a fault in one property never affects another.
- A disaster recovery plan aims to restore connection within an hour.
- Communications are encrypted, the provider holds ISO 27001 certification, and Liberty Online uses SSL and two factor authentication.