Smart Meter? No thanks I'll keep my dumb one.

sheffield_lad

There are so many myths with smart meters and fear when there is nothing to be fearful of.

Nice to see those in the industry dispelling the myths.

A._Badger

Fine, howee. I hope you and your smart meter are very happy together.

My experience, however, suggests that when an industry 'dispels myths' its collective hand is dipping ever-deeper into the customers' pockets.

sheffield_lad

A._Badger wrote: »

Fine, howee. I hope you and your smart meter are very happy together.

My experience, however, suggests that when an industry 'dispels myths' it's collective hand is dipping ever-deeper into the customers' pockets.

Sorry I forgot we are a nation of victims these days with bankers, gov, big business and utilities out to get us all.

A._Badger

howee wrote: »

Sorry I forgot we are a nation of victims these days with bankers, gov, big business and utilities out to get us all.

Then you would be well advised to remember it and add 'eco-loons' to the list, as well.

grahamc2003

Well, if it's allowed to state a negative opinion on smart meters without be declared paranoid, I'd say theres a very serious danger of the £12 billion rollout costs (added onto our bills, as usual), could well be exceeded by a great margin.

I could think of much better low tech ways of improving our electricity supply and getting cheaper bills without spending anything like £12bn.

I also object to the marketing of these things - making out they will reduce our bills by giving us a facility which (for the next several years) will be similar to a £30 Owl.

Long term, they enable demand control, and therefore flattening of the demand curve. Long term that is. Once the hardware and software is developed to do it. And therein lies the rub. Believe me, if this stuff is being led and/or designed and developed by Supplier development teams, it'll be scrapped after a few years and a few billion.

For a negative cost, the peaks in demand (which is where the big costs are) could be reduced by the very simply action of encouraging economy seven night usage. If storage heaters were charged for free (say with 6 hours at night and a 1 hour charge in the low demand afternoon period making e7 heating a good heating system), peak demand would be lowered and the cost of doing so would be negative (due to flattening of the curve, or lowering the peak, or lowering the total system capacity, or avoiding the costs of building so much reliable capacity).

As an aside, this failing to address the real issue of lowering peak demand is the major failing of all of the green thinking these days. Unless capacity can be relied upon to generate at the peak, then it is of minute benefit. Wind and solar are in that category.

sheffield_lad

grahamc2003 wrote: »

For a negative cost, the peaks in demand (which is where the big costs are) could be reduced by the very simply action of encouraging economy seven night usage. If storage heaters were charged for free (say with 6 hours at night and a 1 hour charge in the low demand afternoon period making e7 heating a good heating system), peak demand would be lowered and the cost of doing so would be negative (due to flattening of the curve, or lowering the peak, or lowering the total system capacity, or avoiding the costs of building so much reliable capacity).

Let me guess what type of heating you have lol,

Sounds good but demand is not during the night that's why they give you 7hrs its the tea time balloon (4-7), which is the issue. Ferrybridge power station up in York's has to put on 800t of coal an hour just to meet demand at this time of day.

grahamc2003

howee wrote: »

Let me guess what type of heating you have lol,

Sounds good but demand is not during the night that's why they give you 7hrs its the tea time balloon (4-7), which is the issue. Ferrybridge power station up in York's has to put on 800t of coal an hour just to meet demand at this time of day.

My technical views are irrespective of my personal cirumstances.

I don't understand your final sentence. You say 'It sounds good but ...' and then go onto say something which is exactly why it is good.

Cardew

For the non-technical the peak demand for electricty consumption in UK is early on a winter's evening - hence I assume the phrase 'tea time balloon'!

To meet this peak demand the UK needs 'conventional' generating capacity - solar isn't producing anything and the wind may not be blowing for the wind farms.

Therefore it is an aim to reduce that demand during periods of peak consumption. One facility(eventually) of smart meters will be to charge different rates at different times during the day.

So 'carrot and stick' will be the name of the game. Come home from work, put on electric heating and cook a meal and find yourself paying a premium for electricity at that time.

Aldridge_Andy

Personally I have smart meters, and think they are a great step forward.

My only dissapointment is that when I moved from British Gas to First Utility, my new supplier cannot read the installed meters (allegedly).

Eurobird

When I started this thread my own views as to whether or not I wanted smart metering were made clear.

My thoughts on the entire subject - long post.


The first link I gave to an article in a weblog written by researchers at the Security Group at the University of Cambridge Computer Laboratory gave links to further documents. I feel sure that anyone with a genuine interest has probably read those.

The blog entry itself, written by Prof. Ross Anderson in Sept 2012 contains this closing paragraph:

"We managed to secure a Cabinet Office review of the project which came up with a red traffic light - a recommendation that the project be abandoned. However DECC dug its heels in and the project appears to be going ahead. Hey, we did our best. The failure should be evident in time for the next election; just remember, you read it here first."

You will note that within this thread Prof. Ross Anderson, along with his colleagues at the Security Group were labelled as "a bunch of nutters worried over the 'privacy'"; right, OK then, we can obviously disregard any opinions they may have.

I'll take the opportunity to answer the other questions directed at me in the same post. Yes, there are issues relating to privacy that concern me. No, I did not ban Google from taking a picture of my house, and, finally, I can assure you that I'm not under any illusion that 'they' bugged my phone. I hope you find that amusing, as I do like to entertain occasionally. Oh, and take a look at that 'e' key on your keyboard, it might just be getting stuck.


Smart Meters are a solution desperately looking for a problem. I can see only one long term beneficiary, the energy companies themselves; they may outwardly appear to have the nice smiling face and consumer interests at heart, well, sorry to pop your bubble, their prime concern is profit for their shareholders.

The only single redeeming feature of (electricty) smart metering I'm able to see is that near real-time useage monitoring may, and I emphasise may, provide better optimisation of generating capacity and distribution. But, hey, generators and the grid have been doing that for decades anyway; there's not much more optimisation to be done.


Saving money for the consumer by providing detailed useage information. Yes and No:

I for one will not save money, a smart meter is of no benefit in that regard. Estimated bills don't cause me concern. I'm capable of calculating the power consumption and cost of an electrical appliance to sufficient accuracy for my needs. Yes, even ones that are only operating intermittently, ie fridge, freezer etc, (hint: think duty cycle, wattage [we'll leave aside any power factor correction], hours, unit cost. It's not rocket science, simple maths is the only requirement.

I hear you exclaim - but what of all those people that can't do that! Yes, they may benefit from a smart meter. Equally, a simple £30 monitor will tell them pretty much the same thing.


The remote disconnection issue:

Yes, there is a capability to remotely disconnect the supply. For non-payment, due legal process would be followed, just as at present, disconnection would remain the final option. The only difference is, if disconnection is deemed necessary, because physical access to the consumers property is not required, there is no need for the energy company to apply for a Warrant of Entry.

Now, imagine this scenario, as outlined in "Who controls the off switch?", a paper published by those 'nutters' mentioned earlier; so therefore we should again disregard it. "Millions of smart meters, controlled from a single head-end,and without a proper design exercise to identify and prevent possible malicious attacks. In due course an attacker takes over the head-end and sends a message to all meters instructing them to interrupt the supply. The interruption is made permanent by (for example) also sending out a commend to meters to change their crypto keys to some new value that may be known only to the attacker (or not known at all)."

Won't happen? Can't happen?, Scaremongering? Look back in recent history, it won't be too hard to soon find something that was said of, and it happened.


Smart meters prevent electricity theft and fraud:

So, how much of a problem is that, who's the real loser; lets try to put it into perspective. I obtained these figures earlier today from National Grid's real time data feed. Demand: 47855MW 14:15:00 GMT. - that's 47.8 GigaWatt. Now if someone is able to give me a reliable estimate of the quantity of 'stolen' electricity, preferable with a verifiable reference, I would be most grateful.

Who, actually loses here? Well it's not the energy companies, if a customer tampers with or bypasses their meter in some way, they will only 'lose' the profit that they would have otherwise made had that consumption of electricity been metered. It falls on the generator, they are the real loser.

What are the figures, I suspect that as a percentage of that 47GW it's a miniscule amount. Indeed I would go as far as to say it is probably less than that lost during power distribution. (We don't have superconducting cables, transformers are not 100% efficient, especially the older ones.)


Higher price for those who retain an analogue meter, was a point raised:

Yes, I fully expect so, not however as a 'site visit' charge, a separate, higher tariff would probably raise more revenue, come on guys and gals, think bottom line. Looks like I'm advocating higher prices for myself, that should raise another laugh or two. Others may realise this isn't just about cost.


Use of GPRS to communicate with DCC:

Remember New Years Eve, or Valentines Day when you just could not send that message on your mobile because the network was running at maximum capacity? Now think of an additional near on 50 million smart meters using GPRS every 30 minutes.


The thorny issue of the actual project:

Typical large scale Government IT Project, no, I stand corrected, it was claimed to be an engineering, not IT project; this conveniently avoided the control procedures that are mandatory for large IT procurements.

Quacks like a duck; this IS a large scale IT project. Like so many that has preceded it, again quoting Prof. Ross Anderson.

"Britain has a long history of public-sector IT disasters and the smart meter project displays all the classic signs of imminent failure. There is a quite unrealistic timescale; no stable specification; no clear technical leadership; an insufficiently experienced and accountable procurement team; an over-optimistic view of critical components, such as data communications and standards; the omission of other critical components, such as a means to communicate with the HAN; an inappropriate architecture; and a lack of a systems view."


Privacy:

When it comes to discussing privacy, the oft quoted "Nothing to hide, Nothing to fear" argument is frequently put forth. This is pure fallacy; plain and simple.

Everyone has something which they wish to remain private. Privacy is relative. What I may regard as private others may regard as public, and vice versa.

So, do I think my energy consumption useage data is private? In one respect yes, and in others no.

Yes, out of principle, why should I let a Government Department, (lets not forget this is being driven through by The Department of Energy & Climate Change), gather my energy useage statistics every 30 mins and make it freely available to almost anyone who wants it.

No, because I don't give a monkeys about you knowing my energy useage.


On the subject of databases. Another, hey why don't you read this, it's more 'nutter' material. Albeit, this time published by the Joseph Rowntree Reform Trust. Now almost four years old, however, most of it is just as relevant now as it was then. "The Database State"

www lightbluetouchpaper.org/2009/03/23/database-state/



I'm happy to discuss this further by e-mail if anyone wishes. (Placing my own 'nutter hat' on, perhaps we should use encrypted mail, you never know where 'they' may be. So here's my KeyID):

PGP Keyserver KeyID: 0xDD66E1BC
Key Fingerprint: 94A3 3539 08B2 3133 A6CD 5200 43F7 FC46 DD66 E1BC


Mostly serious, some with tongue firmly in cheek. We don't necessarily need smart technology, just smart people, especially when they are spending billions of our money. Do your own research, or trust the Government, they know best.

A last thought, cynicism increases with age, also you tend to see things in a somewhat different light. I'm old enough to know how to use a slide rule or five figure log tables, but I'm not telling you my age, it's private.



Regards.