Time for some smart metering here - Saving money and CO2

Just back from Ebley Mill (see photo) and a brief meeting to discuss the budget on Thursday. Some important steps towards greening Stroud are being made, but really need to go further and faster.

One painless option to consider...

While smart metering has already penetrated many countries across Europe, UK take-up is lagging; apart from one city in the Midlands – Leicester. There, the City Council has installed an energy and water monitoring system in Council-run properties such as schools, leisure centres, community homes and other public buildings. Data is collected at half-hourly intervals by smart meters and relayed by radio communications to a central system where it is logged and analysed.

Software is employed to establish normal usage patterns, factoring in variables such as weather conditions, enabling any deviations or aberrations to be identified and reported on a daily basis. The system cost some £500,000, and since installation the Council has identified annual savings of around £160,000.

The Leicester metering system is modelled on a similar, but larger-scale Swedish installation in Gothenburg, where the municipal housing association, Poseidon, owns some 23,500 apartments, heated for the most part through the district heating system. Poseidon has invested some £8m in a smart metering system that monitors demand, regulates energy supply, and identifies aberrations. As a result, energy consumption has fallen by around 15% without any significant change in temperatures inside the apartments, even during severe winters. Savings come in at around £2m per annum with annual carbon dioxide emissions reductions totaling some 1900 tonnes. Both the Leicester and Gothenburg smart metering schemes have indicated a pay-back time on the initial investment of just three to four years.

Leicester City Council spends over £5 million a year on energy and water requirements for its own premises, approximately the same amount as a small town of 8,500 houses. Its building stock is extremely varied and includes swimming pools, schools, offices, libraries, museums and district heating for housing estates. The Energy Management Team administers more than 3,000 individual energy accounts. Close monitoring of these resources is absolutely essential if costs and consumption are to be controlled properly. Monitoring and target setting represents a very low cost method of saving energy and yields a very high rate of success.

I've already emailed a Glos County Council Cabinet member who has forwarded it to the appropriate officers for consideration - also sent an email to SDC. If Leicester can save so much money then surely we can also save some? And of course tackle climate change.