Smart metering – key to Energy Union’s objectives

Landis+Gyr supports the European Parliament’s report on “Delivering a New Deal for Energy Consumers” and re-iterates that the timely, widespread deployment of smart metering is key to achieve the Energy Union’s objectives

Zug, Switzerland, May 26th 2016 – Landis+Gyr, the leading provider of smart energy solutions, supports the call for the rolling-out of smart metering systems included in the own initiative report ‘Delivering a New Deal for Energy Consumers’ adopted at the European Parliament plenary today.

“This technology is key to meeting many, if not all, of the policy goals defined by the European Parliament. Today and for the first time, consumers have detailed information on their energy use. This is why smart meters can be seen as the greatest energy consumer empowerment tool in the last hundred years” says John Harris, Vice President and Head Governmental Affairs at Landis+Gyr. “Trying to save electricity without detailed information on consumption and time of use is like trying to adhere to a speed limit without a speedometer in the car. With smart metering, consumers can change suppliers more easily and, based on the information on their consumption patterns, suppliers can offer products most suited to their lifestyle.”

In the report, the Parliament lists a further number of issues that need to be addressed in order to achieve a well-functioning energy retail market that benefits consumers, such as the coupling of retail and wholesale markets and the right to self-generation. Smart Metering technology is essential to all of these:

  • Dynamic pricing is the key to couple the wholesale and retail markets. Smart meters are therefore vital for consumers to fully benefit from falling wholesale electricity prices.
  • In its demand that smart metering rollouts to be “efficient and affordable for all consumers”, the report makes a case for large scale, area-wide rollouts. These are indeed more efficient than point-by-point or selective rollouts and are up to 50% less costly than selective introduction.
  • The report correctly points out that the benefits of smart metering should be shared between consumers and network operators. The biggest hurdles to smart metering deployment in Europe have been fights over burden sharing in respect to investment costs. The only way to solve this challenge is by fairly sharing both benefits as well as costs.
  • Last but not least, Landis+Gyr entirely support the report calls on Member States to introduce net metering schemes in order to support self-generation and cooperative energy production.

The report highlights that, to date, only 16 out of the 28 EU Member States have committed to a large-scale roll-out of smart meters by 2020. “With the support of too few Member States, the infrastructure to achieve the EU’s energy goals will not be in place. There is room to do more and proceed at a quicker pace. Only 16 of 28 Member States have committed to rollouts – what about the citizens in those other 12 countries? Should they not benefit as well?” concludes John Harris.

About Landis+Gyr

Landis+Gyr is the leading global provider of integrated energy management solutions for the utility sector. Offering the broadest portfolio of products and services to address complex industry challenges, the company delivers comprehensive solutions for the foundation of a smarter grid including; smart metering, distribution network sensing and automation tools, load control, analytics and energy storage. Landis+Gyr operates in 31 countries across five continents as an independent growth platform of the Toshiba Corporation (TKY:6502) and is also 40% owned by the Innovation Network Corporation of Japan (INCJ). With annualized sales of more than US$1.5 billion, the company employs 5,700 people with the sole mission of helping the world manage energy better. www.landisgyr.com

Media Contact

John Harris

Regional Contact
Vice President & Head of Governmental Affairs and Public Relations
+41 41 935 6096