Bglobal plc (AIM:BGBL), the leading UK smart metering and energy data company is delighted to announce that its new Smart1 meter is officially ready for mass market residential market roll out across the UK from today.
The Smart1 offers both COP10 compliance for the UK business market and MID approval for roll out across the UK and all EU countries.
The Smart1 is a full-specification, modular, communications agnostic, ZigBee-enabled single-phase electricity meter designed specifically to service the needs of energy suppliers and distribution networks serving the SME and residential metering markets across Europe.
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We collect at least 525,000 readings per month on each meter
The Smart1’s revolutionary design delivers future-proofing against communications change-risk (whether regulatory or technologically driven) as well as compelling cost-saving advantages in the installation process.
Bglobal announced earlier this month that it had received Measuring Instruments Directive (“MID”) and UK specific regulatory approval for the Smart1.The MID (2004/22/EC) is a directive by the European Union (EU) which creates a common market for measuring instruments across the 27 countries of the EU. Meters which receive MID approval may be used in all countries across the EU. Further, the use and performance of Electricity Meters in the UK is governed by Schedule 7 of the Electricity Act, 1989 and supporting legislation. The Smart1 has gained approval for all the requirements referenced by this legislation.
The Smart1 has been designed by Bglobal’s Research and Development team located in Lancashire, UK
and Brisbane, Australia, and leverages Bglobal’s deep understanding of the needs of UK energy supply
customers and end-users alike. Bglobal’s partners in South East Asia are producing the communications
and modem modules whilst Singapore-based EDMI, a long time partner of Bglobal, will produce the meter component exclusively for Bglobal, leveraging their extensive experience in making high-performance smart meters for global markets.
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Chief Executive Officer, Tim Jackson-Smith, said: “The design of the meter offers unprecedented flexibility and significantly de-risks aspects of the UK residential roll out which is likely to be delaying the full rollout of meters to homes and small businesses across the UK. By properly separating the communications and metering components and a using wireless interface (patent pending), a world first for metering, it is possible to roll out a fully compliant smart-ready Smart1 meter with no communications today and return to it in months or years and make it Smart-Now for a fraction of the cost that utilities rolling out full-smart products currently have to bare.
“The smart1 marks a revolution in metering, and one in which utilities can participate today. Utility companies which want to forge ahead with residential market smart metering can deploy the Smart1 and know it reduce their exposure to technological and regulatory risk.
Technical Director Andrew Thomas, comments: “"The Smart1 meter has been built from the ground up specifically for the UK Market. Not only does the product meet the needs of both the business market and current residential requirements (SRSM Specification) for electricity metering, it is a modular future-proof platform that will continue to deliver benefits over the entire lifetime of the asset. We have built a data centric smart metering architecture that not only delivers electricity metering, but also supports Dual Fuel and Gas only installs.
We have shifted the focus of the smart metering system from the meter to the data and communications (The Top Hat(tm) communications hub a crucial part of this). This shift makes the Smart1 meter more cost effective, inherently more reliable and minimises the effect of technology change on the metering device itself."