Another gas explosion in the news.

chanz4

lemontart wrote: »

why would network operator cover it up as most likely an issue at or after meter - usually down to cowboys, cost cutting or stupid careless behaviour with regards to gas appliances and pipes in the property or messing around with meter.

as you will know working for grid, they do incase they are at fault

lstar337

!!!!!! wrote: »

I think its about time something was added to gas to make it less explosive & flammable. You can't be too safe.

They should change it to air, which is much safer.

captainhindsight_2

!!!!!! wrote: »

I think its about time something was added to gas to make it less explosive & flammable. You can't be too safe.

Or swap to district heating systems and catch up with the rest of Europe

lemontart

chanz4 wrote: »

as you will know working for grid, they do incase they are at fault

cannot say I do as the explosions I knew of were for the reasons I stated earlier, Retired for past two years so cannot comment further on grid

Pincher

Tampering is the first thing that came to my mind as well.
It's been on TV previously. I think we should workout whether the supplier actually loses money, as how do they pay for gas the meter did not register.


What if we set up a storm trooper meter reader company, which reports to the Health and Safety Executive, but is funded by the energy industry. They have the power to force entry to examine gas meters and installations. They can wear body armour, and always have a gas mask at the ready.


Obviously no need to be heavy handed all the time. They should be able to monitor gas flow at substations, and compare with meter readings for the area. Target the areas with greater gas loss, and they will catch by-pass thefts, as well as leaks.


It's like the TV License, if you don't shout about TV detector vans, make you sign a declaration when you buy a TV, etc., why would anyone pay?

[Deleted User]

Pincher wrote: »

Tampering is the first thing that came to my mind as well.
It's been on TV previously. I think we should workout whether the supplier actually loses money, as how do they pay for gas the meter did not register.


What if we set up a storm trooper meter reader company, which reports to the Health and Safety Executive, but is funded by the energy industry. They have the power to force entry to examine gas meters and installations. They can wear body armour, and always have a gas mask at the ready.


Obviously no need to be heavy handed all the time. They should be able to monitor gas flow at substations, and compare with meter readings for the area. Target the areas with greater gas loss, and they will catch by-pass thefts, as well as leaks.


It's like the TV License, if you don't shout about TV detector vans, make you sign a declaration when you buy a TV, etc., why would anyone pay?

We have an agency already, its called R.P.U., Revenue Protection Unit.All suppliers should have access to one or run their own. They cost a lot of money to run,millions in the case of British Gas who run the best one. I ve met one of the bosses for the Northern section , he said they have a turnover of 40 million quid and could double that if he doubled his employees, which I believe they have done. Trouble is some suppliers wont spend that money and it appears its cheaper for them to run a skeleton crew,and let them get away with it, as EDF ,EON/Npower do and just let the costs be paid by the majority. TV licences are going the same way with the latest idea to scrap making it a criminal offence not to have one. G4S have got us delivering TV licence reminders and my own street I m very busy to say the least.
Getting into a property can be more or less impossible without a costly warrant/locksmith. If someone does nt fancy letting us in thats as far as its gos. Our managers are paranoid about us upsetting anyone on the doorstep as any complaints the customer can complain and collect £10 leading to the canny ones claiming spurious ones for tiny complaints, eg not dating a call back card or knocking on front door instead of the back ( 2 of mine this year ).
This latest explosion by the way the occupiers seemed to be a nice family and in my opinion they were nt responsible for the explosion , at least by tampering anyway.

Pincher

sacsquacco wrote: »

Trouble is some suppliers wont spend that money and it appears its cheaper for them to run a skeleton crew,and let them get away with it, as EDF ,EON/Npower do and just let the costs be paid by the majority.

This is something I don't understand. If a substation registers 1,000 m3 used, but the sum of all the domestic meters is 600 m3, so there is a leak or by-pass theft, who pays for the difference? Obviously, the suppliers will be a mix of BG, E.On, Scottish Power, Ovo, etc. , so who pays? Also, the suppliers could argue that it's a leak, so why should they pay?

[Deleted User]

Pincher wrote: »

This is something I don't understand. If a substation registers 1,000 m3 used, but the sum of all the domestic meters is 600 m3, so there is a leak or by-pass theft, who pays for the difference? Obviously, the suppliers will be a mix of BG, E.On, Scottish Power, Ovo, etc. , so who pays? Also, the suppliers could argue that it's a leak, so why should they pay?

I was told by a senior Brit Gas RPU man that when the energy industry was first privatised on the electric side only, that energy theft not recovered from the occupier has to be repaid back to the National Grid by the supplier This will prob be at wholesale rates. The set up was different on gas theft and the supplier will absorb the loss, it does nt have to be made good back to the National Grid if it cant be recovered from the bypasser. I assume this is one reason why suppliers dont seem overly keen on detecting electric energy theft. Most of which cant be recovered from the usual transient flat dweller/renter. Ones I have seen get nobbled for thousands of debt on the prepay simply move out to another gaffe pretty quickly and start again. My record amount of theft debt I have seen on a prepay is a whopping 9k in Goole (on a Npower supplied meter ) Occupier responsible soon left leaving a bemused new occupier who did nt get a new key, getting £2 of electric out of a £20 credit
A tv prog, which featured BG revenue protection in action,last year, the head of BG RPU stated that the costs of gas theft are simply passed on to us, like shop lifting, in the shape of approx £60 a year extra.

Cardew

Pincher wrote: »

This is something I don't understand. If a substation registers 1,000 m3 used, but the sum of all the domestic meters is 600 m3, so there is a leak or by-pass theft, who pays for the difference? Obviously, the suppliers will be a mix of BG, E.On, Scottish Power, Ovo, etc. , so who pays? Also, the suppliers could argue that it's a leak, so why should they pay?

I was told by a senior Brit Gas RPU man that when the energy industry was first privatised on the electric side only, that energy theft not recovered from the occupier has to be repaid back to the National Grid by the supplier This will prob be at wholesale rates.

My understanding was that the National Grid has no methodology to determine which supplier's(BG/Eon etc) customer is responsible for the leak/fraud.

Combining both gas and electricity, if we take Pincher's hypothetical loss of 400m3(1000m3 - 600m3). We might also say 1,000,000kWh generated but only 600,000kWh paid for.

How can they attribute that loss to any one supplier. It might be that the culprits are Eon and SSE customers accounting for all that loss and all the BG customers are completely honest. So how do they determine what supplier has to pay back National Grid?(in the case of electricity)

[Deleted User]

Good question Cardew , I remember a long time poster(Terry? ) from London ,who was a management insider, I think for SSE, who mentioned once how the system is set up for suppliers purchasing and retailing energy. There must be some sort of system of measurement of wholesale/retail purchasing of gas and electricity for each supplier.