EU in-house scientific service Joint Research Center (JRC) stated in Smart Grid Projects Outlook, 2014 edition, that Europe has spent $ 4.27 billion on more than 450 smart grid projects since 2002.
JRC mapped out some locations displaying smart grid project density all over the Europe.
Germany has initiated 135 projects so far, but France and UK excels with approx $680 million investments each, says the report.
Highest investment in smart grids per capita and per national electricity consumption is done in Denmark. Slovenia and Czech Republic are prominent countries among the new members who hired strategies for grid testing and implementation.
Eastern European countries are disappointing with less than one percent of total budget for smart- grid investment, the report added.
EU-15 organizations manage 90 percent of their bulk investment in smart grid projects with some kind of public funding support.
Private capital investment share of the total project is 49 percent whereas 22 percent is from EC, 18 percent from national fund, nine percent from regulatory funding and remaining two percent derives from unclassified sources, states the report.
By 2020, Europe aims to achieve 200 million smart power projects with an investment of $48 billion approx.