Smart Meters

MeterMan

Kamili_Jo wrote: »

MeterMan
Primarily because I object to being presented with a fait accompli: your meter needs changing and we're putting in a Smart Meter.
Thus far, I have read nothing that recommends them to me and an interesting conversation with a "Meter Man" confirmed my reservations.

So you don't want one because the government have said everyone should have one. I guess you'll still be buying a petrol car when they get banned too.

zeupater

MeterMan wrote: »

So you don't want one because the government have said everyone should have one. I guess you'll still be buying a petrol car when they get banned too.

Hi

Maybe, but it's far more likely that there's disagreement on the one-off funding model which loads somewhere between £500 & £1000 of additional cost (additional to already charging for ongoing periodic meter replacement within current tariffs!) onto consumers for somewhere between little & zero gross benefit, depending on the accounting transparency/honesty employed by the industry & the level of ongoing energy awareness that consumption awareness instils in consumers' mindsets regarding their usage patterns ....

If the project suits the industry through delivering a better use of assets & saving unnecessary capital investment, then surely it would be fair for the industry to consider investment in smart-meters as simply being a re-allocation of capital away from energy generation to energy management - as it is, the shareholders are eating their cake and the (hoodwinked) government is mandating that consumers should pay them to do so ... twice over!!

HTH
Z

Uxb1

MeterMan wrote: »

So you don't want one because the government have said everyone should have one. I guess you'll still be buying a petrol car when they get banned too.

There is a standard rule of life that all government actions tend to lead to the precise opposite of what was intended.

As you mention cars - those with longer memories will recall the government of the day a decade or more ago was at that time incentivizing everyone though the tax system on fuel to have a diesel car - I ignored that as well: and we know now how that idea worked out don't we?

I too have had endless phone calls to my mobile and landline from S.Power wanting to fit a smart meter - even claiming they were in the area - no they certainly were not - this is a very rural area.
I ignore them all....

emc

Kamili_Jo wrote: »

I object to being presented with a fait accompli: your meter needs changing and we're putting in a Smart Meter.
Thus far, I have read nothing that recommends them to me and an interesting conversation with a "Meter Man" confirmed my reservations.

Uxb1 wrote: »

I too have had endless phone calls to my mobile and landline from S.Power wanting to fit a smart meter - even claiming they were in the area - no they certainly were not - this is a very rural area.
I ignore them all....

Smart meters are NOT compulsory, and there is more and more public awareness of the real costs and issues with smart meters, so the energy companies have been and are continuing to bully customers and resort to dirty tricks to try to force customers to take smart meters.

Xbigman

There are two great lies with the current smart meter rollout. It's nothing to do with smart meters microwaving your brain, or terrorists electrocuting you.
The lies I am talking about are the concept of a smart grid being more efficient and the idea that time of use tariffs will save money.

The first lie - The smart grid.
I'm going off at a tangent here. I work in a warehouse which had 60 pieces of MHE (Mechanical Handling Equipment - electric trucks and forklifts). The management decided that if the shift overlaps were removed we would only need 45 pieces of MHE. Would you believe they called this 'smart MHE'.
So 15 trucks were sent away. 8 months later the 45 trucks have been hammered 24 hours a day 7 days a week. Maintenance costs have skyrocketed, down time is an issue. Things came to a head when a false ammonia alarm put the warehouse behind. Overtime at premium rates was offered and accepted, but guess what? That's right, there was no spare MHE available for the extra manning. So we've hired 14 trucks back (the management presumably not having the 'you know what's' to hire all 15 back). Result - an expensive failure.
The same applies to the so called smart grid. If you build half the number of power stations then they must produce twice as much electric from each one each day and therefore they will have half the lifespan.
The only thing that might make a smart grid 'smart' would be if it could somehow mean people using less electricity. But it doesn't. The current average £11 saving off the average £1100 bill means we would have the most expensive 1% saving in history.
So why is this being pushed at us? We have underinvested in new generating capacity for decades. This is why we have massive polluting coal fired stations still being used that should have been scrapped long ago. The governments advisors have sold the government this turd as the solution. But it isn't and it is costing all of us dear.

The second lie - Time of use tariffs.
There have been a couple of links to Canadian prices on this forum. They showed quite clearly that the peak time - cheap time price difference was poor. The reason is simple. The energy companies need to get a set amount of income in and if peak prices discourage peak usage then the energy companies must put up the cost of the cheap units to get their money in. Some individuals will pay less, some will pay more, but there will be no overall saving. Only using less will save money, and that is not what TOU tariffs are for. TOU tariffs are an attempt to run our less polluting generating capacity more and our older stations less. The issues this will face I've mentioned above.
The bottom line is that smart meters capable of TOU tariffs will be used to push people away from peak usage times to simulate a smart grid so we don't have to invest in actually having a smart grid.


Darren

Reading all that back I realised I have never really defined what a smart grid is in my own mind. It is simply this. A smart grid would have meter readings as a side effect. What it would do is have multiple outputs that could be remotely controlled. At peak times the smart grid could turn off the output that made your fridge/freezer work. Or turn off the output to your security lights. Whatever was needed to bring usage back into balance. Even short term shutting down of your central heating (I'm talking minutes not hours) would be possible. A grid that controls usage and not prices is what is needed.
It won't happen.

Dacron

There seems to be a number of concerns raised in the forum about the introduction of time variable tariffs depending on useage - essentially charging you more during the periods when you use most power in order to "encourage" you to shift your useage to your own personal "off - peak" period by charging less at those times.


Some have suggested this is an entirelly reasonable intention as it will result in a more balanced useage across the grid. On the face of it, that seems reasonable - but in practice it is nonsensical.


We already use our standard off peak rate for dishwashers and washing machines. What other activities can we time shift in this way? Like everybody else, our peak periods will be in the dark, cold winter months when we are indoors for the vast majority of the time. We can't time shift our light useage or heat useage to the times when we are not there! We can't shift our TV watching from the evenings to the daytime when we are at work. Shifting useage such as tumbledrying to either the overnight hours or daytime when no-one is home is downright dangerous.


This really does appear to be a scheme to hood wink us all into facilitating a general increase in power charges which would reflect the Canadian experience. Although sold as an aid to consumers this appears to simply facilitate increased charging by the industry.


Needless to say - we won't be having them fitted anytime soon (though I doubt it will be long before they become compulsory!)

Michaelw

In my opinion wer're unlikely to see any controversal moves' until theres been around 90% plus take up of these meters'.Nearly all devices' are energy efficent these days except of course heating the home being the greatest outlay.There potential risks to the customer also those that decide to retain their traditional meters could possibly be penalised in another form.

Once the inhome display fad is over theres little in the benefit for the end user the meter being the most important source of information as its always been.My HAN led is nearly always flashing red these days.Again in my opinion I found nearly all the information irrelevant/inacurate.

Haarlem

Dacron wrote: »

There seems to be a number of concerns raised in the forum about the introduction of time variable tariffs depending on useage - essentially charging you more during the periods when you use most power in order to "encourage" you to shift your useage to your own personal "off - peak" period by charging less at those times.


Some have suggested this is an entirelly reasonable intention as it will result in a more balanced useage across the grid. On the face of it, that seems reasonable - but in practice it is nonsensical.


We already use our standard off peak rate for dishwashers and washing machines. What other activities can we time shift in this way? Like everybody else, our peak periods will be in the dark, cold winter months when we are indoors for the vast majority of the time. We can't time shift our light useage or heat useage to the times when we are not there! We can't shift our TV watching from the evenings to the daytime when we are at work. Shifting useage such as tumbledrying to either the overnight hours or daytime when no-one is home is downright dangerous.


This really does appear to be a scheme to hood wink us all into facilitating a general increase in power charges which would reflect the Canadian experience. Although sold as an aid to consumers this appears to simply facilitate increased charging by the industry.


Needless to say - we won't be having them fitted anytime soon (though I doubt it will be long before they become compulsory!)

Having worked in the industry the main driver of the introduction of smart meters is to move to time of day charging for domestic users. To change behaviour either by tax or cost is becoming very relevant everyday in so many products. There are much cheaper remote reading systems in use around the world but don't have the facility to record and transmit half hourly readings. Don't forget half hour readings and charging has been the norm for manufacturing for many many years.

I dispute your point that using power overnight as downright dangerous. I realise there has recently been publicity around a particular model of tumble dryer that has a design fault catching fire, but a properly used and maintained there is no problem with washing machines and tumble dyers. In fact most modern machines have a delayed start setting to take advantage of the cheapest rate. It is relevant that the vast majority of fires in the home is caused by fridge - freezers and I know of no-one who turns these off at night.

nigelbb

Haarlem wrote: »

It is relevant that the vast majority of fires in the home is caused by fridge - freezers and I know of no-one who turns these off at night.

Admittedly the Grenfell Tower fire was started by a malfunctioning fridge-freezer & according to the London Fire Brigade there is an average of at least one fridge fire a week but as the LFB tackle 20,000+ fires a year it's a very rare occurrence.

Haarlem

nigelbb wrote: »

Admittedly the Grenfell Tower fire was started by a malfunctioning fridge-freezer & according to the London Fire Brigade there is an average of at least one fridge fire a week but as the LFB tackle 20,000+ fires a year it's a very rare occurrence.

I should have added that fridge freezer fires are the most common fire caused by an electrical appliance.