The number of smart meters installed in the UK jumped by 120% in July from the previous month.
While the number of meters installed was still down 36% from the same month last year, this does indicate that the pace is picking up again after installations had to stop due to the COVID-19 lockdown. In June, installations were down 67% on the previous year.
According to new figures by ElectraLink, July saw 152,000 meters installed, with 20,482 installations in the East of England, 19,913 in the south of the country and 14,728 in the East Midlands.
Cumulatively, there has now been 13,620,245 meters installed since the programme began.
Suppliers began to tentatively restart their installation programmes in June, after they were paused in March to help tackle the coronavirus pandemic.
Prior to this pause, the rollout had already faced a number of challenges with half of suppliers have failing to reach their smart meter installation milestones in 2019, including more than 10% outside of the tolerance allowed.
To aid the transition, the government has extended the obligation for suppliers to take All Reasonable Steps (ARS) to install smart meters by six months as a result of COVID-19. Suppliers will now have until July 2021 to meet the installation milestones required for the ARS stage of the smart meter rollout.
