Federal Government: "Smart Meter Light" for small households not feasible

The Bundestag petition, supported by a total of nearly 40,000 citizens, advocating for the use of small storage units in rental households as a contribution to stabilizing power grids through a simplified "Smart Meter Light" is currently facing a formal obstacle. This was emphasized by Stefan Rouenhoff (CDU), Parliamentary State Secretary at the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy, during a public session of the Petitions Committee on Monday. He referred to the unfortunate experiences with the ongoing smart meter rollout and explained that certifying a stripped-down version of intelligent electricity meters is likely to be a lengthy process despite already introduced simplifications.

Lead petitioner Andreas Schmitz, also known as Akkudoktor on YouTube, highlighted that currently only three percent of German households are equipped with the regular, expensive, and complex smart meters. He emphasized the untapped potential of the approximately two million small storage units in Germany, which, with 18.5 gigawatt-hours, offer about half the capacity of all German pumped-storage power plants. Such mini-storage units could contribute to grid stability, cushioning power peaks, and relieving local grid transformers. However, for legal reasons, they are currently not allowed to do so in most cases.

For many households without larger generation systems or controllable consumers, full-fledged, complex smart meters are not cost-effective, Schmitz said. He therefore called for a modern metering device with simplified data communication and without a return channel – the Smart Meter Light – to enable the grid-friendly use of small storage units and intelligent consumers. It also aims to accelerate the slow ramp-up of the technology.

Plug-in solar devices are already frequently used together with storage units today, the petition states. Such easy-to-use systems should therefore be treated equally to plug-in solar devices in terms of feed-in power, registration, meter replacement, and consolidation. Furthermore, grid fees, taxes, and levies must be centrally, transparently, and automatically retrievable by the Federal Network Agency to use them for autonomous energy management.

Important Element of the "Citizen Energy Transition"

Christian Ofenheusle, Chairman of the Federal Association for Plug-in Solar, supports Schmitz. He explained that the high costs of standard gateways and control boxes are primarily due to the required security technology and data transfer. Since rental apartments typically do not regulate large controllable consumers such as heat pumps or wallboxes, this complex technology and the return channel are unnecessary for the Smart Meter Light. The association generally sees small storage units as a "central building block for the citizen energy transition".

Rouenhoff reaffirmed the German government's fundamental goal of strengthening storage and promoting their grid-friendliness. However, he qualified that "not everything we wish for is technically feasible one-to-one." The integration of small storage units involves a high process effort that distribution system operators are currently unable to manage.

The quorum for Bundestag petitions is reached when 30,000 co-signatures have been received. The smart meter request crossed this threshold in February. The Petitions Committee must then address the request in a public session and, if necessary, initiate legislative steps.

(vbr)