In this article, Oliver Iltisberger, EVP, Landis+Gyr EMEA gives an exclusive interview to Engerati on the challenges of smart metering in Europe.
According to the recent Benchmarking Report by the European Commission, the European Union will achieve 72% coverage of households with smart meters by 2020 but Landis+Gyr believes that this goal is optimistic as planned rollouts are already taking longer and coming with smaller tenders than were originally foreseen. This is according to Oliver Iltisberger, Landis+Gyr’s Executive Vice President for EMEA (Europe, Middle East and Africa), who will be attending the upcoming European Utility Week conference.
Smart Metering in Europe is taking longer, but may come with increased benefits
In an exclusive interview with Engerati, Iltisberger points to smart meter roll-outs in Europe that have taken longer than anticipated. Smart metering was first put on the UK’s agenda with Gordon Brown’s first Budget Speech in 2007, but roll-outs are still in the early stages. The original metering target date of 2020 remains unchanged.
In France, the Linky Roll-out has taken longer than anticipated, and in Germany the Cost-Benefit-Analysis did not advocate an “EU-Scenario”, i.e. 80% coverage by 2020, but even so, the legislation to give a legal basis to that roll-out was planned for September 2014 which has now also been delayed.
Iltisberger believes that smart metering development in Europe will be slower than what the European Union forecasts. He adds, “However, we are still confident that the roll-out will come – and perhaps the silver lining in the delays is that the systems being deployed in the coming years in Europe will have more functionality than those deployed earlier.”
Smart metering developments in Europe will increasingly support the integration of renewables and decentralized generation, says Iltisberger who adds that this will be the foundation of the smart grid and the prerequisite for any significant demand response programmes in Europe. He explains that demand response is also coming later to Europe in comparison to other regions of the world, and will be based on other preconditions. Europe does not have capacity problems in generation or necessarily the network, but must make the maximum use of renewables and micro-generation. Smart metering will increasingly provide the foundation for the development of the smart grid to meet these challenges.”
To read full article please visit: http://www.engerati.com/article/smart-metering-europe-challenges-are-greater.
In advance of the European Utility week where Landis+Gyr and Toshiba will once again be showcasing their smart energy innovations, we invite you to join us at our online webinar, “Energy Transformation & Intelligent Transition to Smart Grids” on 21 October at 3 PM (CET), to find out more about some of our highlights in Amsterdam. Please follow the link below to find out more and register for the webinar.