L’industrie de l’énergie appelle à soutenir les réseaux intelligents[en] 

National energy regulators must offer distribution system operators "an appropriate return" on their investments in R&D and the deployment of smart grids, electricity industry association Eurelectric told a conference yesterday. 

As most European electricity networks are regulated monopolies, incentives will be crucial to develop the technology required to achieve the EU's climate goals, it said.

Smart grids introduce information technology to electricity transportation, allowing energy to flow in two directions. This gives them a superior capacity to integrate both small and large-scale renewable energy into the grid. It allows households to produce their own renewable energy and sell it back to the grid.

The industry said the EU's commitments to reduce CO2 emissions by 20% and produce 20% of total energy from renewable energy sources by 2020 would prove challenging for the electricity grid, requiring as much as 35% of electricity to come from renewables. Moreover, it expects the introduction of electric cars to put the grid under further pressure in future.

"It will not be feasible to add all the renewable energy and other distributed energy generation power to the grid, as it was not built for this purpose," warned Peter Birkner, chair of Eurelectric's networks committee. 

The electricity industry eyes smart grids as a solution, but is worried that it will end up being solely responsible for funding large-scale commercialisation of the technology.

Manuel Sánchez Jimenéz, a senior official at the Commisison's information society department, argued that initial investment had so far presented an obstacle to commercial deployment of the technology. Technically, it would be possible to roll out smart grids within a decade, but uncertain returns on investment and a lack of standardisation are hindering development.

"I think the owner operators are the ones that will make the vast investment," declared Sánchez Jimenéz. But he said regulation must help.

The EU's third energy liberalisation package, agreed in March, paves the way for smart grids by requiring member states to introduce smart meters that allow consumers to monitor their own electricity consumption in real time (EurActiv 25/03/09). At least 80% of consumers should be equipped with intelligent metering systems by 2020.

Moreover, the EU is preparing a new Energy Saving Action Plan in which grids will also be considered, Sánchez Jimenéz announced.