Energy Efficiency Actions Related to the Rollout of Smart Meters for Small Consumers

The installation of electricity Smart Meters (SM) brings about new opportunities for enhancing the interaction between consumers, generators and energy service providers. SM are needed to exert certain sets of actions upon consumers aimed at producing changes in the functioning of the system that can potentially greatly benefit consumers and other parties. Actions to be applied on consumers may be aimed at encouraging them to adapt their behavior to the conditions existing in the system or may directly control their load. The final benefits resulting from the application of SM related actions depend on the nature of the actions, but also on the characteristics of the system and the specific consumer group where these actions are applied. We first lay out the analytical framework to be used to assess the application of different sets of actions in a generic system. Afterwards, we use this framework to determine the SM related actions that should be first implemented in the Austrian system according to the benefits and costs of their application to this specific system. Based on our analysis, the provision to Austrian consumers of advanced indirect feedback on their electric load, together with the application of critical peak prices and simple time-of-use tariffs should already be considered in the short term.