The North American Market for Advanced Metering Infrastructure (AMI) has hit some bumps in the road, in spite of the best efforts of utilities, suppliers, government, and regulators. While the North America market for Advanced Metering Infrastructure and Smart Grid is expected to have a double-digit compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) during the next five years, a recent industry study from ARC Advisory group forecasts that 2009 and 2010 will see only a limited portion of that growth.
AdvancedThe ARC study cites several factors still inhibiting rapid growth of the AMI and Smart Grid market. Among these are immature standards for meter communications and Home Area Networks (HANs), fragmented regulatory authority, and the long project sales and implementation schedules of electric utilities. “AMI is a foundational piece of the future smart grid,” according to Senior Analyst Harry Forbes, one of the authors of ARC’s Advanced Metering Infrastructure and Smart Grid Outlook for North America. “Yet the existing standards for meter communication are very immature compared with Internet technologies, as indicated by the lack of multi-vendor device interoperability. Also, it has been a challenge to scale some of these new HAN technologies to installations of only 1000-2000 endpoints, let alone several million. Utilities are reticent to vastly scale up their AMI installations at huge expense given the present level of technology risk and the rate of technology development.”
via Market Study Predicts Slower Adoption of Advanced Metering Infrastructure – ARC Press Center.
