The European Commission has adopted the Electrification Action Plan, and a targeted amendment to the Electricity Regulation, covering network charges, smart grids, data exchange and smart metering.
What’s in it for smart metering?
- First-ever binding EU-wide deployment targets: 50% of final customers by 2030, 75% by 2033. Smart meters are no longer optional — they’re now a legal requirement across the EU.
- Network tariffs must include time-of-use and capacity-based elements — provisions that only work with the granular, real-time data smart meters provide.
- Smart metering is explicitly named as an enabler of flexibility-based, cost-reflective tariff design.
Our take:
The targets fall short of ESMIG’s ask of 60% by 2030 and 80% by 2032. We also miss a certified-metering-points metric, explicit functional requirements, and an updated cost-benefit approach for full rollout. Referenced cybersecurity and resilience requirements for metering systems are a good start but need to be stronger and binding.
This is an important step in the right direction – but we would have liked to see a bold proposal with more ambition.