Smart meters, need internet?

knightstyle

Some friends are buying a house, it has smart meters from British Gas. They do not have and have no intention of getting Internet so will these meters still work?

Robin9

The Smart meters have their own communication chip - they do not need the internet.

EachPenny

knightstyle wrote: »

Some friends are buying a house, it has smart meters from British Gas. They do not have and have no intention of getting Internet so will these meters still work?

They don't need an internet connection, but they will probably only 'work' if your friends continue to use British Gas (or Sainsbury's) as their supplier. If they switch suppliers the 'smart' functionality will probably stop working, although the meters should still work as standard energy meters.

This might (or might not) be an issue if they wanted to switch to a cheaper supplier.

caveat_emptor

Smart meters use the mobile phone network and are locked in..
So if I want a smart meter and I change supplier I need a new meter.
Farcical, but the consumer pays so that's alright.

Robisere

What if you live in an area with no mobile coverage, as I do? Or have Solar panels, thick house walls, LED bulbs, etc, etc?

http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/bills/article-4291166/Not-smart-New-energy-meters-won-t-work-1-3-homes.html

This whole scheme is totally representative of all major government ideas in the UK: insufficiently thought out, poorly planned, no foresight or forward thinking. Works for some. Then it doesn't. I will not be able to have one, even if I wanted one. Which I most definitely do not.

House_Martin

caveat_emptor wrote: »

Smart meters use the mobile phone network and are locked in..
So if I want a smart meter and I change supplier I need a new meter.
Farcical, but the consumer pays so that's alright.

I have smart meters in my other home. I have changed supplier around 5 times.Same smart meters in place now, they work fine as dumb meters or will revert back to smart if I return to either BG or Sainsburys Energy.
Maybe the Secure Liberty smart meters, used by Ovo and Utilita, may not be accepted with some suppliers as prepayment meters but they are fine as dumb meters in credit meter mode

Carrot007

Robisere wrote: »

What if you live in an area with no mobile coverage, as I do?

For now you will be put to the back of a queue andthey will check covereage occasionally to see if it has changed.

There were plans to have a local transfer of data to a handheld devices so you can send a reader monthly, and even the idea they they would have the ability to just read from the van and not need to get out (Much like they do for HH meters where comms is not possible, which is all smart really is except having a IHD). No idea fi it wil lever happen though.

Michaelw

Robisere wrote: »

What if you live in an area with no mobile coverage, as I do? Or have Solar panels, thick house walls, LED bulbs, etc, etc?

http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/bills/article-4291166/Not-smart-New-energy-meters-won-t-work-1-3-homes.html

This whole scheme is totally representative of all major government ideas in the UK: insufficiently thought out, poorly planned, no foresight or forward thinking. Works for some. Then it doesn't. I will not be able to have one, even if I wanted one. Which I most definitely do not.

The technoloy is not great either.Not much if any better then a 56k dial up modem.

http://trilliantinc.com/library-files/datasheets/ds_Communications_Hub.pdf

The Landis&Gyr display isn't great for prepayment use it lacks information such as unit cost and how much used today and no permanent backlight also its not at a glance understandable but the idea is to use the indoor display.

http://www.landisgyr.co.uk/product/landisgyr-e470-zigbee-smart-electricity-meter/

Digital technology moves at such a pace today that any defined standard is going to be out of date quickly.A British Gas employee they told me they change meters every ten years.

System

Carrot007 wrote: »

For now you will be put to the back of a queue andthey will check covereage occasionally to see if it has changed.

There were plans to have a local transfer of data to a handheld devices so you can send a reader monthly, and even the idea they they would have the ability to just read from the van and not need to get out (Much like they do for HH meters where comms is not possible, which is all smart really is except having a IHD). No idea fi it wil lever happen though.

SMETS2 meters do not need a mobile link from every property. They establish a wide area net (a mesh) across all the meters. Meter readings are passed between meters in the mesh until a meter is found that has a mobile connection to THe Data Communications Company.