The solar system is already on the roof, but the electricity is not fed into the public grid. The reason: The electricity meter has not yet been replaced. This can be frustrating for homeowners.
“Changing the electricity meter is one of the sticking points, the bottleneck so to speak,” says Otto Dräger. He is a project manager at the solar company ageff in Freiburg. She installs photovoltaic systems and also takes care of all application forms associated with them. 80 percent of customers are looking for single-family homes. The company – like other companies – gets a power of attorney from the customer so that it can take over everything.
Then the bureaucratic jungle begins. Among other things, the company first submits the feed-in request to the network operator and then later submits the application for a meter change. Five different network operators are responsible in the catchment area in which Dräger operates. “It’s always different depending on the network operator. There is no uniform system. Some network operators have digital portals through which everything runs, and with others everything still happens via email,” he describes the situation.
Waiting for that Bidirectional counter
Then you have to wait for the feed-in commitment, and later wait for the meter to change. “For smaller systems such as single-family homes, if there is no response from the network operator after four weeks, it is enough to put the system into operation.” The owners of smaller systems could then at least supply themselves with the electricity from the solar system, says Dräger. “But the system is set so that nothing is fed in yet.” Because as long as there is no bidirectional meter, the feed-in quantity cannot be documented.
Bidirectional meters mean that, on the one hand, it counts the additional electricity you use if the solar system is not sufficient. On the other hand, what is fed into the public grid by the solar system is documented. If this bi-directional meter is missing, the customer loses money, namely the feed-in tariff; on the other hand, the system could already produce solar power that flows into the grid. But that just doesn’t work.
“We have customers who wait months for this meter change,” says Dräger. Depending on the network operator, the waiting times vary. “With some you can specify the appointment online, the meter is replaced, everything is quick and easy. But then there are network operators where you don’t hear anything for ages, you call the hotline again and again.”
“You are a supplicant”
Peter Wortelkamp, a customer of ageff GmbH, waited eight months for the meter to be replaced. His system was completed in July 2022, and then nothing happened. “I stood frustrated in front of our home power plant and had to watch the system turn down in the sunshine because our battery was charged and we couldn’t feed it in. It’s unbelievable. How are we supposed to achieve the energy transition like that?”
At some point he called the hotline himself. “It’s frustrating. You’re a supplicant, you have to wait and you just don’t find out anything. No feedback as to what the problem is,” he criticizes. “As a private citizen, you take the initiative and invest, of course also out of your own interest, but then you don’t even find out what the problem is.” He doesn’t know how much money he lost in those eight months. But that’s not what he’s primarily concerned about, but rather how he’s treated.
Solar expert Dräger gives an example: An average solar system with storage system on a single-family home, if optimally oriented to the south, produces around 10,000 kilowatt hours per year. If the bi-directional meter is not installed, then at 8.2 cents per kilowatt hour per year the customer would be missing out on around 7,000 kilowatt hours, or 574 euros.
Demand and bottlenecks due to new laws
However, it is rarely the case that the installation of the bidirectional meter takes a year, says Dräger. The general manager of the Baden-Württemberg Electrical and Information Technology Association, Andreas Bek, sees the reason for the long waiting times primarily as the demand for systems is currently very high.
There is a legally mandated photovoltaic system requirement for new residential buildings in Baden-Württemberg, and there is an obligation to retrofit roofs. Added to this, according to Bek, are the enormous increases in energy prices and comparatively low prices for photovoltaic modules.
“Many network operators can hardly keep up with this development, as the expansion of the charging infrastructure for e-mobiles, for example, is progressing rapidly.” In addition, the dismantling of oil and gas heating systems or the exchange for heat pumps required additional reports to the network operators. This means the number of registration processes is increasing enormously – “at the expense of the electrical trade companies and at the expense of their customers,” admits Bek.
Self-employed person Theoretically possible to change the meter
The Federal Network Agency points out that if the network operator delays the necessary meter replacement, the system operator may also have his own meter installed in order to be able to put the system into operation without further delay. This was taken up in May 2023 as part of a legal reform.
Henning Lorang is managing director of KLE Energie GmbH, a solar company in Rhineland-Palatinate, on the border with Saarland. He also knows the delays in his area. It is now legally possible to replace the meter yourself. But on the one hand, many people don’t know that, and on the other hand, they don’t want to make basic cooperation with the network operators more difficult. “Tradesmen who install photovoltaic systems actually have to be energy lawyers in order to be able to negotiate with network operators on an equal footing,” says Lorang.
Bek summarizes what the companies want: “Less bureaucracy and, above all, a digitalized system for network connections for all electricity network operators. There are more than 900 network operators nationwide.” There should be a unified system by 2025, but there is still a long way to go.