Survey Reveals Lack of Confidence Among European Utilities Professionals Regarding 2020 Target

Energy & Utilities IQ has recently conducted a survey to assess the thoughts and concerns of smart utility industry professionals about the 2020 target regarding smart utilities set by European governments.

The targets are based on "Europe 2020," which is an economic and reform package from the European Union.  Survey respondents were from a variety of utility companies such as utility providers, technology providers, IT providers and consultants. Sixty-six percent of these respondents are currently looking into an investment in either smart metering (23%), smart grids (5%) or both technologies (38%).

The results of this survey reveal that only 38% of industry professionals think that the 2020 target will be met. This might be because of the lack of government support to help move smart utility technology from theory into practice: 76% of respondents think that the government is not doing enough.

The respondents were also questioned about what they see as the biggest challenge in terms of introducing smart utility technology and the biggest concern for 41% of respondents is knowing which technical solution to select. Other major concerns of industry professionals are start-up costs (16%), lack of government support (6%) and securing internal buy in (5%). It was also stated that convincing the consumers about the value added for them can be a major challenge.

Another part of the survey focused on the security of smart utility technology. For 64% of organizations involved in smart utilities, security was stated as a concern. Thirty-nine percent even consider the security issues as a "serious concern."

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