Unlocking value for water customers: The benefits of smart metering

Smart meters for the water sector: talk to the industry, and their widespread deployment is a no-brainer, an essential tool in tackling water scarcity.

But there’s frustration the rollout hasn’t happened sooner. Or as Paul Horton, chief executive of The Future Water Association, puts it: “Smart meters are a long time coming. Why have we waited until now, when the resource we are managing is under some of the greatest pressures? We break records every year in terms of dry spells. So, we are at an inflection point with smart. Let’s just do it.”

Andrew Tucker, water demand reduction manager at Thames Water, is similarly emphatic: “The southeast of England is a water-stressed region. We need to act now to protect our future resources. [That’s why] we have legal powers to fit water meters at all properties in our region.”

But the industry has perceptual hurdles to overcome. Tanya Dady, director at Dayworth Consulting, who is working with Horizon Water Infrastructure, says: “Everyone thinks water should be free because it falls out of the sky. But we are going to run out of water [the way we are going] and certain areas are going to run out of water by 2040 or 2045.”

The Environment Agency agrees. According to the agency’s latest modelling of population growth, climate change and environmental sustainability, there could be a public water supply deficit of up to 5,000 million litres a day by 2055 – enough water to fill Wembley Stadium 4.5 times every 24 hours.

Sixty percent of that deficit will need to be addressed through demand management and leakage reduction, the agency says – which is where smart meters are already proving invaluable.

But how do water companies at early stages of smart metering get the best outcome for customers? One factor to consider is the total cost of a smart meter programme, explains Daniel Reilly, managing director of Horizon Water Infrastructure (HWI). “The longer your meter is in the ground, the better the return on investment.”

Rather than having to replace smart meters at the end of an eight- or 10-year cycle, which ultimately means a bigger bill for the customer, HWI is working with Southern Water over a longer timeframe for smart meter delivery [see case study, below].

“Water companies may not be thinking about the total cost of ownership or the programme, they are thinking short term.”

Read on to find out about:

• How to engage with customers, cut bills, and change consumption behaviour
• The potential of Metering-as-a-Service (MaaS)
• Why Southern Water has adopted a MaaS model
• Why a smart meter is only as good as the data it transmits