Metering logistics company Meter Provida said suppliers need to consider now in their planning stage that old, replaced meters need to go back to their owner, or the owner needs to be notified that the meter is available for collection.
Meter Provida’s business development manager Tom Woolley said that although the mass rollout has yet to get underway a backlog is already building.
Woolley said: “If we ignore this we will have meter-mountains around the UK, there are already warehouses dotted around the UK full of old meters. If we go to some of our third party installers we will see meters stacked up where they’ve got nowhere to put them.
“If we keep ignoring that problem if we don’t address it right now as part of the planning stage, it will just get completely out of hand.”
Suppliers are expected to install 900,000 meters a month during the mass rollout, due to start next year.
Woolley said that suppliers need to remember that 900,000 meters installed means 900,000 old meters to process, enough to fill 20 warehouses.
Suppliers have already installed 1,327,400 smart meters in domestic customer properties ahead of the mass rollout, the government revealed last week.
Installation ramped up during quarter two 2015 with 272,600 smart meters being installed, a 29 per cent increase on the number in quarter one.