the present invention relates generally to detecting energy theft within an energy distribution system and more particularly to systems and methods for detecting energy discrepancies in voltages and / or currents reported by electric meters present in a distribution circuit , without requiring installation of additional hardware at the transformer . typically , the location of each of at least two meters is determined with respect to a transformer . the line resistances within the distribution circuit are determined starting with a line resistance farthest from the transformer . estimated line voltages are determined for at least one electric meter using the estimated line resistances , and the estimated voltages are compared to actual voltage readings for the at least one electric meter . the existence of line loss is determined based on this comparison .