The earliest electric energy meter (also known as electricity meter) was made in 1881 according to the principle of electrolysis, although this energy meter weighs tens of kilograms each, very bulky, and no guarantee of accuracy, but at that time it was still valued and praised as a major invention in the scientific and technological community, and soon adopted in engineering, with the development of science and technology, in 1888, the discovery and application of alternating current, and put forward new requirements for the development of electric energy meters. Through the efforts of scientists, the inductive energy meter was born. Because inductive energy meters have a series of advantages such as simple structure, safe operation, low price, durability, and easy maintenance and mass production, they have developed rapidly.
China's AC induction energy meter is in the 50s of the 20th century from the imitation of foreign energy meter production, after more than twenty years of efforts, China's electric energy meter manufacturing has a considerable level and scale, with the development of science and technology, and AC induction energy meter overload capacity, service life requirements. China in the 80-90s began the development and production of long-life electric energy meters, mechatronic energy meters (semi-electronic energy meters), all-electronic energy meters, multi-functional all-electronic energy meters, prepaid electric energy meters, multi-rate electric energy meters, maximum demand meters, loss energy meters, etc., after 2000, these semi-intelligent electric energy meters are widely used in household electricity, commercial electricity and other aspects.
In 2009, after the British government first applied the first batch of meters with network communication functions to household electricity, China State Grid immediately proposed the concept of "smart meters" in China: the State Grid Corporation of China's 26 network provincial companies, in the second half of 2009, concentrated on the development of unified technical standards, just in the State Grid Corporation to build a smart grid environment, so the future purchase of energy meters are unified as smart meters. At that time, the main thing was to solve the problem of stepped electricity price and remote meter reading, of course, there were some functions to be expanded later. In fact, the functions of smart meters have been reflected in the original semi-intelligent energy meters, which is nothing more than the State Grid equipping the meter with network communication and photoelectric communication functions, issued in the form of industry standards.
