Electricity market liberalization offers new trends, innovations

A series of innovations that are changing the way households and enterprises manage energy consumption and offering benefits to consumers as well as suppliers are beginning to make their presence felt in Greece as part of the energy market’s ongoing liberalization.

The energy market’s liberalization process, as already seen in more mature markets, stretches beyond mere tariff price offers made by various electricity suppliers to also cover the fields of energy savings and efficiency. New players usually introduce technical innovations in these fields to change the rules of the game.

Rather than focus entirely on offering the lowest electricity tariffs, emerging suppliers offer clients wider packages leading to energy efficiency improvements, lower consumption and financial benefits.

Professional clients such as retail chain networks stand to gain considerably, while the potential benefits for households are not negligible. IT systems are applied to help steer clients towards greater energy efficiency.

Results in more advanced energy markets abroad have shown that consumer energy savings range between 3 and 5 percent.

Such figures mean that a retail chain consuming 250,000 KWh annually, for example, can save between 80,000 and 180,000 euros in a year. Savings figures such as these would swiftly cover investments needed to transform to new ways.

The prospective installation of digital power meters in Greece will fundamentally change energy consumption patterns through monitoring, consumption control and demand response systems.

Even so, certain independent suppliers are not waiting for the country’s grid operaror to install digital meters to the system, but, instead, are offering clients the opportunity to have digital systems installed within their properties as an addition to the current conventional meters. This upgrade would allow households to improve energy efficiency.