Smart Meters

Gerry1

carl.waring said:

As I said, the article backs you up. 

And this backs me up.

“The availability of radio teleswitching has been progressively extended and as of early 2021 the service was due to remain in operation until at least March 2023”.

Shell have failed to use due diligence: the service won't be ending in March 2022.

But the worst scaremongering are the wild assertions that "it’ll be unable to switch to your tariff’s cheaper off peak rates", "a permanent interruption of your home’s central heating, and the ability to record your energy usage accurately".

The meters will still switch at the default times.  Mine still did when R4 Droitwich failed or was off the air for maintenance a few years ago.

In reality, I suspect that even if Radio 4 is no longer broadcast on Long Wave, the transmitters may still run at reduced power to maintain the data service for the electricity industry for the other data users and as a frequency standard for quite a while.  The Allouis transmitter on 162kHz has remained on the air for similar reasons despite the France Inter broadcasts having ceased in 2016.

oldandwizend

All these concerns(!), some valid, some debatable, some invalid, about anything with the tag ‘smart’ (smart meters, smart motorways, smart TVs etc. etc.) is beginning to make me wonder whether I really should have eaten all those SMARTies in my youth!

With regard to the smart meter debate my main gripe is being told how much they will benefit the customer. I have yet to come across anything new that, whilst it may benefit the customer, is not of greater benefit, not to mention profit, to the industry concerned.

[Deleted User]

oldandwizend said:

With regard to the smart meter debate my main gripe is being told how much they will benefit the customer. I have yet to come across anything new that, whilst it may benefit the customer, is not of greater benefit, not to mention profit, to the industry concerned.

If you are prepared to engage with the programme, then there are savings to be made. For example, I am on a 2 tier time-of-use tariff that offers me a 5p/kWh for 4 hours and a 14.2p/kWh price for the rest of the time. Last year, our average unit price was c.8p/kWh with very little effort on our part. My wife and I are long retired and at home each day.

Increasingly, we will see more time-of-use tariffs. BEIS has recently procured a time-of-use tariff comparator. I am sure that MSE and others are working on similar tools. These comparators will use historical usage data to select the cheapest tariff available based not just how much energy is used per year but when it is used. The Smart Grid now has to cope with variable renewable generation so profiling of consumers’ usage is a key part of the smart meter strategy.

 Alarmists will focus on the fact that these meters have remote disconnection built in: yes, they do, but there are a lot easier ways of disconnecting 000s of people from the Grid than sending out 000s of meter messages. Where remote disconnection is being used in other countries such as Spain, it is normally linked to a specific tariff where the consumer pays less because he/she has agreed to limit their demand (in kWs not kWhs) at peak demand times. Disconnection is only initiated if the consumer ignores texts; IHD messages to turn some things off etc.

The Government is now fully committed to domestic smart meters and with over 100,000 installations per working day in 2020, smart meters are now installed in over 50% of homes. My guess is that smart meters will only remain voluntary for so long. The problem of smart meters in apartments appears to have been resolved with the rollout of AltHAN, and radio masts are going up at a rate in the Northern region.

I am not defending the management of the programme which has been abysmal, but smart meters are here to stay. 

http://www.frontier-economics.com/uk/en/news-and-articles/articles/article-i6106-time-to-pick-up-pace-of-dynamic-electricity-pricing/#

fifthofwhisky

carl.waring said:

Well okay. It collects readings and associated data. The point being it does not collect anything like the information fifthofwhisky thinks it does.

And yes, it is as secure as anything possibly can be. No-one’s said it’s perfect. No technology is.

You opened with a strong statement (lying) and wound it back. I have spoken to someone with good knowledge who explained in great technical detail beyond my level of understanding. In summary, it seems that electrical devices have a signature and can be identified accordingly. Such information can lead to various inferences around social criteria. So at least a guess as matelodave mentions above.

[Deleted User]

fifthofwhisky said:

carl.waring said:

Well okay. It collects readings and associated data. The point being it does not collect anything like the information fifthofwhisky thinks it does.

And yes, it is as secure as anything possibly can be. No-one’s said it’s perfect. No technology is.

You opened with a strong statement (lying) and wound it back. I have spoken to someone with good knowledge who explained in great technical detail beyond my level of understanding. In summary, it seems that electrical devices have a signature and can be identified accordingly. Such information can lead to various inferences around social criteria. So at least a guess as matelodave mentions above.

You can see for yourself what SMETS2 meters can and cannot do. The identification of electrical signatures is possible and there are a number of devices on the market (such as VoltAware) that a consumer can buy to monitor appliance usage; however, the requirement for appliance monitoring is not built into SMETS2 meters.

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/68898/smart_meters_equipment_technical_spec_version_2.pdf

I confess that I have no idea what you mean by ‘lead to various inferences around social criteria’.

victor2

It amuses me that you see so many largely unfounded conspiracy theories around smart meters discussed on forums and social media (much of which is owned by those trusty people at fartbook), where many times the amount of data is already gathered and used to their financial benefit.

The UK government(s) has failed miserably in the roll out of the relatively simple smart metering system. One has to conclude that they are equally incapable of making or allowing any use of what little data it could potentally provide.

carl.waring

fifthofwhisky said:

carl.waring said:

Well okay. It collects readings and associated data. The point being it does not collect anything like the information fifthofwhisky thinks it does.

And yes, it is as secure as anything possibly can be. No-one’s said it’s perfect. No technology is.

You opened with a strong statement (lying) and wound it back. 

And I was right. They do not do any of the things stated in your original post.

(e.g. data which can be derived such as type and brand of devices in the household, social data, etc.)

"type and brand of devices" cannot be identified. What can be "derived" and "inferred" is irrelevant. Well, to me at least.

[Deleted User]

Why would energy suppliers such as Octopus and Shell be working in partnership with companies such as VoltAware and Smappee if what is being suggested is available to individual suppliers via smart meters? Monitoring of appliance signatures (noise) requires CT clamps and the involvement of the end user. This link explains more:

https://voltaware.com/

There is a key paragraph in the link:

Quote: Smart meters typically send data every half an hour, which would limit the scope of Voltaware services as the data resolution would not be high enough. To resolve this, a Consumer Access Device (CAD) needs to be plugged into the meter to send smart meter data with no loss of granularity to the Voltaware platform. Unquote

The end user has complete control of any CAD connected to a smart meter HAN. 

matelodave

fifthofwhisky said:

carl.waring said:

Well okay. It collects readings and associated data. The point being it does not collect anything like the information fifthofwhisky thinks it does.

And yes, it is as secure as anything possibly can be. No-one’s said it’s perfect. No technology is.

You opened with a strong statement (lying) and wound it back. I have spoken to someone with good knowledge who explained in great technical detail beyond my level of understanding. In summary, it seems that electrical devices have a signature and can be identified accordingly. Such information can lead to various inferences around social criteria. So at least a guess as matelodave mentions above.

Dunno where this "knowledgable" bloke got his knowledge. but the only signature that stuff has is the amount of current that it consumes and maybe some interference from something like a washing machine motor. Even the Voltaware thingy described above only measures and logs consumption, but at a much more granular level than a smart meter and then interprets what it tninks is in use and by doing it frequently enough (and it relies on you telling it what is on) it can make an educated (AI) guess.

A reasonably intelligent person could probably deduce that a 3kw load for three or four minutes is the kettle being put on, or for half an hour or so at lunchtime is possibly the cooker. 50 watts for a few minutes three or four times an hour throughout the day and night might be a fridge or freezer.

Likewise some motor noise at sometime in the morning might be a washing machine, hoover or even a lawn mower but as smart meters can only measure power consumption and not noise then any consumption amount would only be a guess about what is in use (a contiunous 100-200 watts for four hours in the evening is probably a telly but could also be a an incandescent table lamp or a computer)

AI (artificial intellegence) may at some time be able to make a reasonable stab at what is in use based on the consumption, duration and time of the day but TBH in what way is it an intrusion to know when I'm having a cup of tea or cleaning my teeth.

Everyone in the street knows when I'm in a bedroom, the lounge, the kitchen, mowing the lawn or watching the telly and if the car isn't in the drive there's a better than even chance that I'm not there (when my mobile phone will be able to pinpoint excatly where I am) and if the caravan is not there I'm probably on holiday - it doesn't need a smart meter and oodles of computing power to work out what I'm up to.

In fact ypour voluntary participation on this forum tells a lot more people about you, where you are and what device you are using than a smart meter ever will.

Gerry1

The Spy Under The Stairs

Extracts from the VoltAware website:-

Every appliance has its own electrical fingerprint. We see them every time they are used. Voltaware works by analysing electricity data either from its patented sensor or smart meter data.The Voltaware algorithm then automatically breaks down individual appliances from the total load, enabling a wide range of home insights.Voltaware can instantly detect appliance fingerprints without requiring any calibration from you as a user.Voltaware differentiates between the consumption of the main appliances at home without requiring any user input.AI is at the core of Voltaware...  Appliance Detection...  Home insights... elderly monitoring... real-time monitoring...  occupancy. Currently the appliances disaggregated are:Air conditioner,Dishwasher,Electric boiler,Electric heating,Electric oven,Electric shower,Electric stoveElectric vehicle,FridgeFreezer,Tumble dryerWashing machine.

Voltaware is using more than 50 electrical features, such as active power, reactive power, harmonics, transient, etc.

Still want a smart meter?