Smart meters are a cornerstone of digital infrastructure for the energy transition. They enable real-time data collection, help monitor and track integrated energy systems, and inform operational and strategic decisions. Smart meters enhance consumer and provider engagement and unlock demand-side flexibility that modernise grids, integrate more renewable electricity, and improve operational efficiency and resilience. They are, simply, essential infrastructure for achieving climate targets and building a cost-effective, secure energy system.   Global deployment of smart meters has accelerated since 2010, with over 1 billion units installed. Combined with smart tariffs and digital controls, smart meters could enable household savings of 5-15% on average and are central to unlocking flexibility benefits across power systems. Nevertheless, barriers to deployment remain, including issues with data privacy and security, interoperability, standardisation, skill gaps, and legal or bureaucratic delays.

Repairability indices and labels are regulatory instruments that provide reliable and transparent consumer information to guide markets toward longer-lasting and more resource-efficient products.   Developing clear and robust repairability and durability indices is complex, as these metrics must be both technically meaningful and easily understood by consumers. Ensuring that energy‑efficient appliances remain affordable is also a key concern, as is designing policies that effectively influence consumer behaviour.

By 2050, around 2.6 billion people will require both heating and cooling, underscoring the need to rapidly decarbonise district heating. Today, district systems provide about 10% of global building heat demand, with 90% still supplied by fossil fuels. Low‑carbon sources such as recovered heat from data centres offer significant potential; recovered heat alone could meet roughly 10% of Europe’s space‑heating needs by 2030.   Barriers to the decarbonisation of district heating include limited data on available low‑carbon heat sources, the challenge of reducing emissions from waste incineration, and resilience concerns during periods of low wind and solar output. Developing district heating infrastructure in already built up metropolitan areas represents a challenge.

Governments rely on a range of policies to encourage both manufacturers to improve the energy performance of their products and consumers to adopt more efficient options. Clear and accessible consumer information is a crucial part of this effort; simple, effective messaging can significantly stimulate the uptake of energy‑efficient appliances. Policies can ensure that consumers have access to relevant information at the moment of purchase, and that this information is tailored to their decision‑making habits. In addition, intermediaries, consumer organisations, retailers, and installers need to be well‑informed about the benefits of energy‑efficient appliances so they can share this knowledge with customers.   A major barrier to strengthening consumer information and engagement is the long-term nature of these policies, as appliances are replaced infrequently. In addition, policy messages can be quite complex and hard to tailor. Comparative databases can help consumers evaluate efficiency, while policy makers must also contend with misinformation and misleading claims.   This Policy Exchange Workshop was held exceptionally as a public webinar.