30 million smart meter milestone in Britain

More than 30 million smart meters are now connected to Britain’s national smart meter network, the Data Communications Company (DCC) has reported.

The 30 millionth meter was connected to the network at midday on March 1 by E.ON.

With the average daily connection rate approaching 16,000, the number of connections is growing apace and corresponds to over 18 million homes, or about 70% of all homes now being connected.

“Reaching 30 million connected smart meters in over 18 million homes is another landmark milestone in pursuit of our purpose to make Britain more connected so we can all lead smarter, greener lives,” says Angus Flett, CEO of the DCC.

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Gill Baker, Director of Smart Field Connections at E.ON, says the company is delighted at having fitted the 30 millionth smart meter.

“[We] are equally proud to have fitted more than five million others before this one and are pleased to be part of this exciting milestone for Great Britain’s energy system.”

The smart meter network is considered a critical part of the nation’s energy infrastructure and an important platform for digitalising the power grid, enabling real-time data delivery to customers, network operators and suppliers.

With its use, the DCC estimates current CO2 savings at 1.125Mt/year.

DCC work programme

To advance its use, a range of initiatives are currently underway by the DCC, of which a key one is the migration of the more than 15 million first-generation SMETS1 smart meters to the network.

As of November 2023 (the last data available), almost 11.6 million SMETS1 meters were connected to the network.

Closely related is the central switching service, which is aimed to reduce the supplier switching to five working days and subsequently to 24 hours.

In particular, the ‘Enduring change of supplier’ (ECoS) programme is aimed at enhancing the security of a switch, with the essential component the replacement of a key on the smart meter. The migration from the previous programme to the ECoS is currently underway and due for completion in Q2 2024.

The third major initiative is the rollout of dual band communications hubs, which are intended to enable the smart meters to communicate in buildings such as apartment blocks or with thick walls where communication is not possible with the single band hubs – about 25% of British households.

These hubs use the 2.4GHz frequency of the single band hubs as well as a HAN frequency of 868MHz and are expected to open up the benefits of smart meters to these households.

Further updates on Britain’s smart meter rollout are expected with the release of the government’s annual review for 2023, which is included with the March release of the quarterly update.