Smart Meter Pros & Cons?

aleph_0

GingerBob wrote: »

Complicated! And in any case fridges need power all the time.

My company is a massive user of electricity and has differential rates throughout the day. It needs an energy manager and an accountant to sort it all out. This idea is just not on for your average domestic consumer. I aleady have it, in fact. Night rate and day rate, and the amount of stuff I can put on during the night is pretty limited - tumble dryer and that's about it. Even these two basic rates, together with all the other guff you get from the supplier, makes my bill difficult to deal with. Can you imagine the problems if differential rates are applied across the board to everyone. As for switching off applicances remotely, we're a VERY long way from that. Switching off the supply remotely is another thing:

Would you trust NPower to get it right all the time and not wrongly disconnect someone?

Well, I trust them to provide me with 240V of power at 50Hz whenever I want it, through a reliable meter. Whilst I'm sure there's potential for mistakes, through suitable security and regulation, they should be minimized.

Fridges don't need power all the time, at least not full power. They can quite easily wait an extra 15 minutes, say, before doing some intensive cooling. Obviously, a smart fridge, designed around the fact that such requests might be made, is required. But such appliances could be a useful tool in managing spikes in demand.

Obviously, I'm not saying an hour-by-hour rate is suitable for domestic users. But the flexibility to have different tariffs can't be bad. For example, a tariff which offers a lower rate early afternoon, or cheaper energy at weekends. Or, we could have a reduced price of energy on a certain number of weekdays/weekends each year, with the actual days announced closer to the time, based on generation capacity.

[Deleted User]

Norman_Castle wrote: »

Has it been confirmed this was caused by bypassing the meter?.

BG RPU say that the house and meter was so badly damaged it cannot be established 100% but are confident, ( by their payment record ) that a bypass was in place and was the cause
I once walked into a house with gas hissing out of the meter , so fast you could hear it. Occupiers had been reversing the meter and not done up the unions properly in rush. This is what probably happened at Dundas RD

spiv1

Hi. You had a day off work to wait for man to read your meter.
What do you think you pay all that money for each year in standing charges.
You're doing there job for them.