About: Smart meters Archives

The “active participation” of citizens and local communities in the supply and demand of electricity will be “the leitmotiv” of new energy proposals the European Commission is preparing for the end of the year, according to a senior EU official who ruled out harmonisation of national support schemes for renewables at this stage.

Transmission system operators are struggling to fulfil their traditional mission of maintaining security of supply in a rapidly evolving environment driven by digitalisation.

Half of Europeans could have solar panels on their roofs by 2050. And the trend won’t stop as small-scale energy cooperatives bring in eight times more revenue to local authorities than big utilities, argues Dirk Vansintjan.

Half of EU citizens – including local communities, schools and hospitals – could be producing their own renewable electricity by 2050, meeting 45% of the EU’s energy demand, according to new research published on Monday (26 September).

A transition to an intelligent electricity grid in Europe can take place without smart meters, industry players have said, in comments that will embarrass the European Commission, which pushed a Europe-wide plan to roll out smart meters years ago.

EXCLUSIVE / The age of traditional energy consumers is almost over, Climate Commissioner Miguel Arias Cañete will say today (13 July), before outlining plans for Europeans to take control of consumption and production.

Saving energy consumption in buildings will play a key part in Europe’s transition to a clean, secure and efficient energy system.

In Germany, a lot has been written about two energy megatrends of our time, liberalisation of energy markets and decentralisation of the energy landscape. What we think has been neglected is a third megatrend: digitalisation.

European energy companies must provide better information to consumers, helping them to understand what they are paying for and whether they getting value for money, writes Věra Jourová.

The European Commission’s vision of an Energy Union with citizens at its core, where consumers take ownership of the energy transition, is to be applauded but needs to be followed up with genuine policy change, writes Jonathan Gaventa.

Europe's electricity sector needs to open up to the Internet of Things, where objects are connected to each other via the World Wide Web, policymakers told a Berlin industry event on Tuesday (2 June).

Behavioural energy efficiency programmes could help European consumers save 12 billion kilowatt-hours of energy and €2.4 billion, writes Alex Laskey.

Last November, Felix Lindner came very close to shutting down the power supply of Ettlingen, a town of almost 40,000 people in the south of Germany.

SPECIAL REPORT / Europe’s ambitious plan for 80% market penetration of smart meters by 2020 is failing to live up to expectations. A senior energy official at the European Commission admits that market penetration is still very low, particularly in the new member states, and that there is a big shortfall in investment.

European Union smart grid operators and energy providers need common cybersecurity measures to help them guard against attacks, says a new report by Europe's information security agency ENISA.

After decreasing steadily for years, household electricity consumption in 2010 reached its highest level in two decades, says a report by the European Commission.

EU countries must do away with the distorting influence of state intervention and step up efforts to implement internal energy market rules, which could save consumers an estimated €13 billion a year, says a report by the European Commission released Thursday (15 November).

The European Union put down the last piece of the bloc's 2020 climate and energy policy puzzle by adopting an Energy Efficiency Directive. The directive is a game-changer for energy companies, which are now required to achieve 1.5% energy savings every year among their final clients. The EU law is also expected to trigger the largest revamp of Europe's existing building stock to date and set new standards for public procurement and energy audits.

Industry is waiting for national energy regulators in each member state to decide how to distribute the costs involved in the roll-out of smart meters, which could fall on consumers, depending on each market's 'peculiarities', John Harris, of smart metering company Landis+Gyr, told EURACTIV.

The European Commission is likely to draw a benchmark report on the costs and benefits of smart meters by mid-2013 and urge member states to inform it as soon as possible of their assessments and roll-out plans.