DCC to adopt SMETS1 meters last, MPs told

The Data and Communications Company (DCC) will only adopt the early specification smart (SMETS1) after it has adopted the newer (SMETS2) meters, MPs were told on Tuesday morning.

Giving evidence to the Energy and Climate Change Select committee (ECCC) the Smart DCC managing director Jonathan Simcock told MPs that the SMETS2 meters are the “priority”.

The higher specification meters will not be rolled out until the DCC is fully operational, which is expected to be in 2016, but these will enrol straight into the DCC’s communication infrastructure system.

The 400,000 SMETS1 smart meters, across both electricity and gas, that are currently installed will be operated on “legacy systems” by the suppliers until the DCC starts to integrate them “at a later date”.

Simcock said: “There are interoperability issues with SMETS1 meters, but our main focus is on the SMETS2 world now.

“Then we will bring SMETS1 into the DCC so they have the same interoperability as SMETS2 meters.”

He added: “We will have work to do to work out how the bring SMETS1 meters in to the DCC, but we have not done that yet.”

The chief executive of Smart Energy GB – the organisation responsible for the organisation responsible for the national advertising programme – Sacha Deshmukh added that it is important for the early adopters of smart meters to have the ability to switch supplier and keep the smart functionality of their meter.

He told the committee: “It is absolutely key that it is delivered.

“Consumers have to be able to shop around and we need to get them to benefit as quickly as possible from the full range of benefits from smart meters.”

However, he did add that the early adopters of smart meters “are no worse off then the rest of us having to live with the old technology”.