Abstract
Consumer acceptance of smart meters remains crucial in achieving the potential carbon emission reductions offered by advanced metering infrastructures. Given this, the present research used deliberative focus groups to examine what is needed to secure acceptance and engagement from domestic consumers with services, products and ‘offers’ in smarter power systems. Our findings suggest that consumers are able to identify not just threats relating to smart metering initiatives but opportunities as well. In particular, our focus group participants responded positively to the idea of an automated system that could be used to achieve energy savings in combination with time-of-use tariffs. We conclude by outlining suggestions for policy recommendations that may help consumer acceptance of smart meter enabled services be more readily achieved.
Highlights
The installation of smart meters into millions of homes across Europe, the USA, Canada, New Zealand, and Australia is one of the biggest energy industry change programmes in history (Darby, 2010)
While our focus group participants were initially weary of smart meters, there is some indication that the benefits they may offer may go some way to promoting consumer acceptance
On the basis of our initial findings we provide some recommendations for aspects that we propose need to be considered in the future design of smart meters and their practical applications within the home, if the UK government wants the rollout of smart meters to have an impact on domestic energy demand
Summary
The installation of smart meters into millions of homes across Europe, the USA, Canada, New Zealand, and Australia is one of the biggest energy industry change programmes in history (Darby, 2010). As Smart Energy GB, the body responsible for promoting smart meters in the UK, observes, “Smart meters aren’t mandatory – consumers can choose not to opt in. This means the rollout is not something happening to us – it will only work if we all actively and enthusiastically opt in.” Yet, current research has predominantly focused on the technical and system configurations involved with smart metering with non-technological topics, such as consumer acceptance of’‘smart services’, attracting considerably less attention from researchers (Solaimani et al, 2015; Wilson et al, 2014). The research that has examined consumer acceptance and engagement with smart meter enabled services (SMES) has tended to focus on the use of smart meters to provide feedback to consumers about their energy usage via an in-home display
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