Following the official Programme launch in late September
2017, the Irish electricity Distribution System Operator
(DSO), ESB Networks, has embarked on the journey to
deploy smart meters to all Irish electricity customers. A
transformed energy retail market, a manual meter reading
process which has existed for over 90 years and a desire to
provide better information to customers are some of the
drivers for this significant business and digital technology
transformation.
The seeds were initially sown for this project between
2008 and 2011 when ESB Networks conducted customer
behaviour and technology trials with 10,000 customers
which looked at the behavioural impacts of smart metering
on a sample of the population of Ireland. Following on from
the completion of this work ESB Networks worked with
the Commissioner for Regulation of Utilities (CRU) and the
public to develop Time of Use (ToU) Tariff propositions and
to understand the needs of the Pay As You Go community.
All of this work was to develop a well rounded deliverable
National Smart Metering Programme.
The main stakeholders of the National Smart Metering
Programme (NSMP) including the CRU, ESB Networks, Gas
Networks Ireland and the Energy Suppliers then embarked
on a period of consultation to develop a series of policies to
support the introduction of Smart Metering.
The programme itself is one of the largest transformation
projects in the history of the Irish state as it aims to
revolutionise the Irish energy market by installing smart
meters which are capable of providing interval data directly
to the market. The high level objectives of the NSMP include:
- Encourage energy efficiency
- Facilitate peak load management in the Irish energy sector
- Support renewables and micro-generation
- Enhance competition and improve customer experience in the Irish energy market
- Improve network services
The programme will be delivered by ESB
Networks over three distinct phases of work,
which will deliver the incremental addition
of high-level functionality to the Irish Energy
Market.
- Phase 1 (2017 – 2020) enables the
installation of 250,000 meters and the
delivery of the Market Schema changes by 2020 which
will facilitate the flow of half hourly interval data to the
market.
- Phase 2 (2021 – 2022) will support the installation of
an additional 1 million smart electricity meters and
the enablement of the remote and local service switch
operation in smart electricity meters.
- Phase 3 (2023 – 2024) will see the installation of the
remaining one million smart electricity meters, along
with the activation of Gas Smart Metering services and
In-Home Data services by 2024.
The Smart Metering programme will have multiple
benefits for ESB Networks, Suppliers and most importantly
customers. The programme will deliver a more competitive
electricity retail market through better service offerings,
ease of switching Supplier and changing address. The
programme will provide Suppliers with improved
opportunities in relation to ToU tariffs to enhance their
relationship with customers. Finally, customers will see an
end to estimated bills, be better informed of their energy
usage patterns and will also be able to avail of more
suitable, flexibility based tariffs from their Suppliers.
ESB Networks' ambition is to deliver a low carbon future
for our 2.3 million customers powered by a smart electricity
grid, with smart metering being core to that ambition
Contact Details:
Web: www.esbnetworks.ie