Latin America’s smart electricity meter market set to boom

Latin America’s smart electricity meter market is set to grow at a rate of over 20% annually from 2023 to 2029, a new analysis from Berg Insight reveals.

In 2023 there were around 14 million smart meters in place in the region, but by 2029 the number is projected to reach almost 43 million units, increasing the penetration from 6.5% currently to over 18%, Berg Insight reports.

At the same time, annual shipments are projected to grow from 2.6 million units to nearly 6.7 million over the period.

Slow to take off and fragmented in approach, the smart metering market is now becoming increasingly active as a number of utilities across the region are in the early stages of deployments, with the main driver being the high non-technical electricity losses due to the prevalence of energy theft.

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Smart grid drivers in Latin America

Smart metering in the region is expected to be driven by the two largest markets, Brazil and Mexico, together accounting for almost three-quarters of annual shipment volumes.

Brazil, the region’s largest and historically most advanced market, is expected to increase its smart meter penetration from 5.6% in 2023 to 18.8% in 2029 as several utilities including Cemig, Copel and Enel have invested significantly in the deployment of AMI, particularly the latter’s subsidiary Enel São Paulo, which aims to install more than 8.8 million smart meters by 2030.

In Mexico, the penetration rate of smart electricity meters is forecast to increase from around 8.5% in 2023 to nearly 22% in 2029.

Countries including Colombia, Ecuador and Peru also are expected to grow their smart metering deployments, increasing their share of the annual shipments in the region from around 6% in 2023 to over 18% by 2029.

Of the only two countries that have implemented nationwide smart metering projects, in Costa Rica the penetration surpassed 50% in 2022, with ICE aiming to reach 100% by 2035,

In Uruguay, the rollout is in its end phase, with full smart metering coverage expected during 2024.

Highlighting the expected tripling in annual smart meter volumes in the region, Mattias Carlsson, IoT Analyst at Berg Insight, says: “The smart metering landscape in Latin America is not only growing, it is transforming. In Colombia alone, we are expecting a six-fold increase in annual smart meter shipment volumes by 2029.”

South and Central American countries

Among other countries in the region, the installed base of smart electricity meters in Argentina is projected by Berg Insight to almost quadruple from more than 0.25 million to slightly over 1 million over the forecast period.

In neighbouring Chile numbers peaked in 2018–2019 and have since decreased, mainly due to regulatory ambiguity but are expected to pick up again.

In the two landlocked countries, Bolivia and Paraguay, which are also among the least mature smart metering markets in the region, growth is expected to be only modest and largely in the smart metering pilot phase.

In Central America, Honduras has long been deploying smart meters and ended 2023 with an installed base of over 0.5 million.

Other countries with relatively low installed bases are El Salvador, Guatemala and Panama and these are expected to slowly increase in scale, from around 10,000 units in 2023 to more than 82,000 in 2029.

Smart meter vendors

Berg Insight hasn’t identified in its public release the breakdown among vendors or technologies but has pointed to the increasing success of Chinese meter vendors, with a key contributing factor being their ability to offer competitive pricing.

Gridspertise also announced recently its July milestone of surpassing the delivery of 1.5 million smart meters with its technology in the region.

Some key figures offered by Gridspertise include a reduction of the reconnection time to less than 1 hour, around 90% reduction in technical and commercial complaints, over 65% reduction in late payments and an increase in the effectiveness of reading to over 99%.