"The Italian tariff scheme has allowed the investment in new smart meters and the replacement of the old meters," said Gallo, who is director of the Infrastructure and Networks division at the Italian utility.
At the same time, energy distributors have benefited from a 5% reduction in their yearly meter management costs, he added.
"For this reason the impact on both system operators and customers in the medium term is negligible," Gallo said.
Moreover, he revealed that periods of service interruption per customer have more than halved from 128 minutes per year to 49 minutes, bringing down the related annual costs for DSOs from 80 euros per customer to 49 euros.
According to Gallo, smart meters can increase energy efficiency significantly with real-time meter readings. Enel estimates that consumption peaks have been reduced by 5% due to greater customer awareness and clear price signals.
The next step would be to cut greenhouse gas emissions further by integrating small-scale renewables into the power grid, Gallo said. This involves on-site renewable generation, whereby electricity consumers sell energy back to the grid from rooftop solar panels or small wind generators, for example.
"This is to be achieved through use of aggregators that will help match the power supplied by various distributed renewable sources and the demand by groups of consumers equipped with smart meters," Gallo said.
Enel's two-billion-euro investment programme fitted all the company's Italian customers with smart meters in five years, by far the biggest roll-out in Europe.
Gallo believes the company has benefited from being an early mover. He dismissed any concerns that future standards for metering equipment might lead to stranded investment.
"Now we can rely on our experience as well as on all the relevant data should the system be re-engineered at a later stage, taking into account new standards and equipment," Gallo said.
Moreover, Enel is starting to install 13 million smart meters in Spain, with new technology based on the system used for the utility's Italian customers, the director said.
"As anticipated following the launch of the project in Spain, we are creating an open meter association that will help European countries join a common set of standards at the European level," Gallo said.
