Over one million smart meters have been installed so far in Great Britain this year according to data from ElectraLink.

Continued recovery from the drop in installations caused by COVID-19 in August led to the milestone, with just under 183,000 smart meters installed in the month, up 20% compared to July.

East England came in on top with 24,000 installations, followed by Southern England with 22,000 installs and the East Midlands with 18,000.

However, August’s figures were still down 17% compared to the same month in 2019 and figures for the year so far are also lower than 2019, when 1.761 million smart meters were installed across the eight month period.

In Q2 of this year, smart meter installations were down 850,000, with just 135,000 smart meters were installed in homes between April and June.

The drop in installations seen in 2020 came as a result of the COVID-19 lockdown, with installations pausing from March before restarting again in June.

As a result, the government extended the obligation for suppliers to take All Reasonable Steps (ARS) to install smart meters by six months, with suppliers now having until July 2021 to meet the installation milestones required for the ARS stage of the smart meter rollout.

August was not the only month to see a resurgence in installations, however. Installations in July grew by 120% compared to June, with 52,000 meters installed.

And earlier this month it was revealed by the Data Communications Company (DCC) that over five million SMETS2 smart meters had been installed in the UK.

The milestone was reached with the installation of a meter at a location in Lincoln by Bulb Energy on 7 September 2020.