Gary Adams — Head of Retail Operations and Smart Transformation at Northumbrian Water Group (NWG)

• Gary made one point abundantly clear: installing a smart meter is not a technical formality. It is a strategic moment of truth — a customer experience touchpoint with the potential to strengthen or undermine brand value. 

Reflections and Lessons Learned

• Strong senior sponsorship is essential  
• Cultural change is slower than technical implementation — and often more emotional.
• Pilots should be followed by strategic pauses — allowing time to absorb, reflect, and scale 
• The original vision was too ambitious — it had to be phased, and that’s not a failure, but wisdom.  

Top Takeaways

• Smart  metering is a data-driven, customer-first utility strategy — not just a  tech upgrade.
• Real  success lies in translating billions of readings into practical, visible  customer value.
• Timely  implementation hinges on internal transformation: from procurement and      warehousing to data governance and customer engagement.
• Open  standards (like NB-IoT) and flexibility in supplier relationships are  essential for long-term resilience.
• The  next challenge is scaling smart operations without losing sight of  inclusivity and user experience.

 Key Takeaways:

• Start before you're ready — perfect systems aren't a pre-requisite for  real-world benefits.
• Design for scale and learning — agile delivery trumps gold-plated planning.
• Customer  co-creation works — employees and their families helped shape a better experience.
• Smart  metering is a business-wide catalyst — forcing improvements in data,      contact, and service.

• Alex delivered a high-level overview of how the water sector can ready itself for large-scale smart meter rollout in AMP8. 
• Alex outlined core delivery risks, including supply chain constraints, workforce gaps, and IT infrastructure limitations. He emphasised the need for proactive planning, regulatory flexibility, and collaborative partnerships across utilities, regulators, and tech providers. Smart metering, he argued, must be integrated with broader network systems to unlock real-time insight, predictive analytics, and eventually autonomous water grids.
• The talk called for industry-wide data standardisation, AI integration, and smarter investment strategies to shift from reactive maintenance to proactive asset management. 

• In a measured and thoughtful presentation, Ehab from Aqaba Water Company gave a rare window into the challenges of deploying smart metering in extreme water-scarce conditions. Jordan is one of the driest countries in the world, and in the city of Aqaba—though lucky to have relatively stable water supply—every drop still counts.
• The project started with urgency and ambition. Yet, as the speaker candidly admitted, early overconfidence in rapid deployment created real difficulties, particularly in training staff to work with new smart meter technologies.  
• NRW reduced by up to 50% in some zones through basic meter upgrades alone.
• DMA  segmentation (from 15 to 42 zones) was critical for control and data integrity.
• Illegal  use remains the #1 challenge—not technical, but behavioural and economic.

• Michaels presentation underscored a critical point: the tech works, but people and process must catch up. United Utilities is investing in cultural transformation as much as infrastructure. Model offices, smart control centres, and proactive demand insight teams are all part of the plan. And to tackle public perception, they’re offering customers a “lowest bill guarantee”—installing meters without enforcing measured charges, unless the customer benefits.  

Key Takeaways

• United  Utilities will install 1 million smart meters in AMP8—up from 180,000 in   AMP7.
• Data  volumes will grow from 6 million reads to 9 billion annually.
• Outsourced  delivery model centralises accountability with one provider.
• Smart  meters enable more granular leak detection and targeted customer  engagement.
• The  bigger challenge is cultural: aligning field staff, call centres, and operations to a smart mindset.

•  Emily from Netmore delivered a fast-paced, insightful presentation on smart metering rollout, sharing lessons from their collaboration with Yorkshire Water. Making the case for a “network-first” deployment model—prioritising infrastructure before meters—and championed a clustered installation strategy for maximum efficiency. Emily also acknowledged challenges like logistics, signal issues in deep chambers, and complex stakeholder coordination. She stressed the need to test, adapt, and empower frontline teams while always planning for scale. The talk closed with a call to use metering infrastructure for broader IoT gains—from leakage detection to site security. The session’s Q&A revealed lingering gaps in connectivity, adoption, and customer experience—sparking several new lines of inquiry for future exploration. 

• Faced with water losses of 34% and corrosive soils attacking poorly selected steel pipes, Walla Walla went beyond meter accuracy. They installed towers double the vendor’s recommended height for AMI reads, reaching 95% of their network, and achieved over 99.8% data collection success. Meters were moved to public rights-of-way to clearly separate utility and customer responsibilities  

Key Takeaways

• AMI  can support real-time pressure, flood, sewer, and chemical monitoring—not      just billing.
• High-quality  device management is critical and easily overlooked.
• Investment in infrastructure and staff upskilling pays off.
• Don’t wait for regulators—be brave, vote for your own upgrades.
• Customers  won’t always change behaviour just because they have data.

• The presentation had a two-part structure: first, a tour of smart metering initiatives across Queensland’s councils, and second, a deep dive into an innovative research project on time-of-use (TOU) tariffs from Hervey Bay, a coastal town where David previously led water operations  

Key Takeaways

• Smart  metering enables targeted, data-driven engagement, not just blanket policy tools
• Peak demand is highly concentrated — often solvable through focused behaviour change.
• Local  government-run services need bespoke approaches, not one-size-fits-all  tech.
• Infrastructure savings come from customer partnerships, not just capital investments.

• Rick opened with the candid truth: if you think smart metering is about meters, you’ve already missed the point. Meters are just the gateway. The real value lies in the data, insight, and operational transformation they unlock—if done right.
• In a frank reflection on decades of smart metering deployments, Rick drilled into real-world operational issues: overlooked training, supply chain mishaps, data reliability gaps, field force fatigue, and the critical need for post-installation support. In one cautionary tale, a poorly trained QA team triggered mass alarms just by inspecting meters too eagerly—an “analogue” consequence of a digital deployment.
• He stressed that radio comms are inherently imperfect (expect ~4% failure), which demands robust SLA monitoring, operations centres, and continuous improvement from day one—not “when things go wrong.” Crucially, once go-live happens, the project team disappears. If the organisation hasn’t culturally absorbed the new tools and workflows, failure is just one glitch away.

• There’s nothing quite like having your worldview (and orbit) expanded by someone from the space industry. Rob opened by admitting his mission was clear: to convince attendees that satellite-based LoRaWAN is not only technically feasible, but commercially viable, and more relevant than many in the utility sector realise.

We heard compelling case studies:

• Dubai Electricity & Water Authority, who abandoned their in-house satellite      plan to partner with Lacuna.
• Wales County Council, who replaced bucket-based water quality sampling with      low-cost, satellite-connected sensors.
• Peatland  monitoring in Indonesia, where data on soil moisture enables access to      carbon credits.
• Precision agriculture, the company's core commercial base, where nitrate and water      monitoring optimises fertiliser use.

• With looming EU regulations (Cyber Resilience Act, RED), smart meters are now classed as critical infrastructure. Attackers are watching. One U.S. company lost 3.8 million users because of weak device-cloud authentication. Sharam’s call to action? Let security specialists handle device protection—so water companies can focus on value creation and customer trust.

Key Takeaways

• DIY cybersecurity is a liability
• Outsource device security to experts now
• Regulations are coming fast.

• Stuart co-presented with Rebekah East, Senior Customer Engagement Lead, Affinity Water  
• The talk had a clear arc: from setting out Affinity Water’s long-term smart metering rollout (over three Asset Management Periods, with one-third of the network smart every five years), through to the detail of customer onboarding, contact centre scripting, and digital account adoption. The goal? By 2050, Affinity Water aims for 110 litres per head per day (PCC), 15% reduction in business demand, and a 50% cut in leakage.    

Top Takeaways

• Behavioural change  is as important as infrastructure.
• A proactive,  empathetic contact centre is vital.
• Customer  communication must be layered, timed, and jargon-free.
• Post-installation  metrics are a goldmine for continuous improvement.
• There’s still  ground to cover in reaching full customer understanding of smart metering  benefits.

•  Chloe, delivered a punchy and practical talk on how behavioural science can drive meaningful water efficiency. With the UK facing a massive water shortfall by 2050, Chloe argued that smart meters are only part of the answer—getting people to change how they use water is just as crucial.
• Spotlighting campaigns like #LeakyLooChallenge and Water Saving Week 2025, which blend psychology, simplicity, and timing to reach millions. The real challenge? Water waste is invisible, urgency is low, and old habits are hard to break. But with trusted messengers, cleverly timed nudges, and a new Evaluation Toolkit to measure impact, Chloe showed how behaviour change can move from idea to litres saved.  

Key Takeaways:

• Behaviour  change is a major lever for tackling water demand.
• Simplicity  and timing matter more than bombarding people with facts.
• The invisible  nature of water waste makes customer engagement uniquely challenging.
• Science-backed  campaigns, tailored moments, and trusted voices are essential.

• Aaron opened with a stark fact: England and Wales are heading toward a serious water resource crunch. Smart water metering, with £1.7 billion of proposed AMP8 investment, is now at the core of how the sector hopes to change behaviour, cut leakage, and improve data-driven decision-making.   

Drilling into specifics:

• PCDs (Price Control Deliverables) are now hardwired into the regulatory      framework, with penalties for underperformance.
• New  standards are emerging on hourly data reads, weekly transmission rates, and system interoperability.
• Capability maturity assessments are being piloted to track companies' readiness.
• The Water Efficiency Lab (WEL) will fund up to £25m in innovation, split across  tiers—from moonshot ideas to scalable pilots.

Key Takeaways:

• Smart  water metering is now a regulatory imperative, not a pilot programme.
• Sector-wide  governance and technical standardisation are the missing links.
• Innovation  funding is critical—but must be tightly integrated with delivery  challenges.
• Customer confidence and affordability must remain central to the smart rollout.

• The scale of the NHH challenge is staggering: just 1% of premises use 30% of the UK’s water. Within that, 8% of premises account for 80% of NHH use. One size cannot fit all—corner shops and chemical plants need vastly different approaches. Kye championed segmentation and differentiated engagement strategies as the only viable way forward.
• A key challenge emerged around the “logger vs smart meter” debate. Many customers already have loggers delivering high-frequency data. Replacing them with smart meters that add latency or reduce insight risks alienating users. But Kye reframed it: loggers and smart meters are not competitors—they’re complementary. Smart meters provide the big picture; loggers offer the detail.  

Top Takeaways:

• NHH market  is disproportionately important for water use.
• Behavioural  segmentation is essential—tech alone isn’t enough.
• Logger vs  smart meter isn’t a zero-sum game— they can work together.
• Tariff  innovation and customer-led data access are next frontiers.
• AMP8  represents a step-change—but only if engagement keeps pace.

• Will was joined by Sam Barton, a senior manager at the firm.  
• The presentation was structured around eight themes, moving briskly from the global context (USA and Australia are scaling hard) to the UK’s deployment challenge. Drawing from energy sector experience, they highlighted the “appointment problem”: it took 12 contacts to land one install, and even then, 40% failed. It was a cautionary tale for the water sector—get appointment-led installs right, or face delays and cost blowouts.
• Will and Sam stressed the importance of getting and using smart data. It's not just about installing meters; it’s about ensuring signal health, data continuity, and turning insights into action. Efficiency and debt prevention should be embedded into every customer touchpoint—from billing to high usage to CRM journeys. As Sam put it, “You can’t retrofit smart into a 2005 billing system and expect miracles.”  

Key Takeaways:

• Scaling from 2M to 10M meters is a five-year, sector-wide transformation.
• Installation  is only half the job—operability and data integrity are critical.
• Appointment-led models need sophisticated engagement engines.
• CRM and billing systems must be rebuilt with smart data in.  

• Jason took the audience through Anglian Water’s rollout journey, from humble trials in Newmarket in 2016 to the successful delivery of nearly 1.1 million meters by early 2025—two months ahead of schedule. COVID and a global chip shortage may have stalled things, but they responded with sharp run-rate increases and agile delivery. At peak, the team installed 2,000 meters a day.
• Jason  laid out their two-AMP strategy, geographic prioritisation, and reliance  on partners like Arqiva and Sensus.
• Then  came the operational complexity—building 300+ masts, standardising field  tools, and handling internal/external access challenges.  

Key Takeaways

• Smart  meter rollout is about systems, not just installs.
• Internal  access and data integration are major hurdles.
• First-time-right  installation is essential for cost control.
• Agile  delivery and installer feedback drive performance.
• Real-time  data pipelines are critical for scale and leakage response.

•  From the outset, Dr. Al Hader emphasised that AMI meters, while crucial, are insufficient alone. Without a connected platform—specifically, an AI-driven digital twin—smart meters risk being reduced to mere billing tools. In Abu Dhabi, smart metering is not a standalone project but a pillar in a broader data integration ecosystem spanning SCADA, GIS, CMMS, weather feeds, pressure sensors, and customer data.  
• One of the session’s most eyebrow-raising stats? A 1% reduction in non-revenue water in Abu Dhabi equates to $31 million in savings per year. So yes, accuracy and integration are not just nice-to-haves—they’re strategic imperatives.

Top Takeaways:

• AMI meters must feed into a broader, AI-driven digital twin to unlock full operational value.
• Data quality, not just data quantity, determines  the effectiveness of leak detection and forecasting.
• Visualisation tools help target investment and accelerate decisions.
• Battery life, signal strength, and customer      feedback loops are vital for field success.
• Smart meters are the “eyes” of the system; the digital twin is the “brain”.

• Ethan kicked off with Kraken’s story—born inside Octopus Energy and now powering platforms across 65 million customer accounts globally, including 5 million in water. Kraken, he explained, isn’t just a billing system—it’s a full-stack platform that includes MDM, CRM, payments, and behavioural engagement.
• Drawing from energy, Ethan highlighted the wildly successful Saving Sessions, where over 1.5 million people voluntarily reduced electricity use. “You can’t tell people to stop using water for three months,” he joked, “but the principles still apply: data, agility, trust, and good UX.”   

Key Takeaways:

• Behavioural  lessons from energy can inform water strategies—but not be copy-pasted.
• Gamification  works—but only if the customer already wants to engage.
• The  future lies in integration across energy and water to show true cost and  impact.

• Robin, speaking on behalf of Southern Water on a strategic implementation panel, delivered a pragmatic and provocative call for the water industry to rethink how it approaches smart metering. His core message? Simply installing meters won’t change behaviour—it’s time to stop expecting different results from the same old methods. Robin argued for reimagining everything from funding models to programme design, warning that once smart meter rollouts begin, the sector is committed to 10–20 years of ongoing replacement and engagement. He highlighted the importance of trust-building from the outset, warning that smart meters “enter people’s space”—and inconsistent installation disrupts customer confidence before data even starts flowing.
• Robin also urged the sector to think beyond its own boundaries, noting that smart energy and water behaviours are beginning to collide. For example, energy companies encourage overnight appliance use, just as water utilities rely on low-flow hours to detect leaks. This points to the need for cross-sector collaboration, shared pilots, and transparent communication with customers. Robin believes the real power of smart metering lies not in the technology, but in what it enables—data, insight, and an opportunity to engage customers with meaningful value. “Let’s not waste it,” he concluded, “because we may only get one shot to get it right.”

• In a wide-ranging and data-rich presentation, Matt from SCV Water delivered what might be described as “Smart Metering: The Greatest Hits, California Edition.” Titled California Dreaming, his talk traced how real-time data from AMI systems is transforming utility operations, water conservation efforts, and customer engagement across Santa Clarita Valley.
• Matt began with a pain point familiar to many: the mismatch between production and billing data. Monthly billing distorted perceptions of water loss—but with AMI, those temporal gaps are closing. Real-time clarity has enabled better analytics (via Power BI), faster leak detection, and smarter planning.  

Key Takeaways

• AMI  closes the gap between production and billing data, correcting false water      loss signals.
• Real-time monitoring enables demand curtailment, targeted outreach, and smart  enforcement.
• AI  and predictive analytics support leak detection, customer behaviour  change, and proactive asset management.
• Data  must be contextualised with GIS, demographics, and weather for real insight.
• The  future lies in AMI integration with home water systems and utility operations.

•  The Strategy Panel Implementation panel offered a rich and candid exploration of the sector’s journey from rollout to real results. With perspectives from Rosie Rand (Thames Water), Dr. Sam Fox (Water UK), and others across the industry, the session focused not only on the technology but the behavioural, social, and structural shifts required to make smart metering work.   
• Rosie Rand, Smart Metering and Demand Reduction Lead at Thames Water, delivered a grounded, insight-rich perspective from the non-household frontlines. Responsible for rolling out over a million smart meters—including nearly 60,000 to businesses—she highlighted the complexity of serving non-household customers within a fragmented wholesaler-retailer framework. With different rollout technologies and policies across wholesaler regions, retailers are often left juggling competing systems. Thames has responded by improving data-sharing, leveraging MOSL’s central platform and its own initiatives to deliver granular smart data that drives billing accuracy and customer behaviour change.
• Rosie stressed the growing opportunity around continuous flow. She revealed that 25% of NHH meters show signs of continuous usage—of which 30–40% can be resolved with a single notification. 

• As Chair of the Water UK Smart Metering Strategy Group, Dr. Sam Fox brought a system-level, forward-looking voice to the day 2 strategic implementation panel. Framing  the sector’s transition from planning to delivery, noting that while individual companies may be at different stages, now is the time to extract shared lessons and accelerate alignment. Dr. Fox highlighted the work of the new Demand Observatory, a cross-sector initiative collecting insights from smart meter rollouts to inform both short-term tactics and long-range behaviour change strategies.
• Dr. Fox emphasised the urgent need for customer segmentation. Averages, he warned, mask reality. Real-world engagement requires tailored messaging—whether for tech-savvy users, the financially conscious, or the environmentally driven. He also pointed to a glaring data gap: the UK doesn’t yet know what’s being trialled across the country, particularly around digital portals and public awareness campaigns. 
• He made a compelling case for sustained engagement, integrated portals, and the strategic use of AI—while also warning about AI’s hidden water footprint. In essence, Dr. Fox argued for smarter systems, sharper strategy, and a long-term cultural shift towards water as a precious, shared resource.