SMETS2 vs SMETS1 meter

PixelPound

zeupater wrote: »

Hi

The issue is that the capabilities of smart-meters have absolutely no correlation with JiT at all ... without vast consumer expenditure on energy management systems & IoT enabled devices & appliances there's very little infrastructure advantage from having smart-meters apart from providing the industry with the appropriate tariff related (tiny)carrots & (huge)sticks to encourage consumers to shift demand patterns ....

The grid will still need to be managed and that management will still be frequency related generation balancing ... the idea that information provided by every installed smart-meter will be collated & processed on a real-time basis to help grid management is akin to belief in fairies, yet it's still used to justify the project ...

The very concept of smart-metering has been overtaken by events & technologies ... greater savings on peak evening demand than envisaged in the project justification have already been delivered by LED technology in lightbulbs & TVs, smart home technologies are available which are more capable at delivering demand shifting, microgeneration has negated much of what smart-meters were supposed to deliver, and the massive impact of home batteries & EVs are well outside both the scope & capabilities of the metering project .... yet we're still committed to line the pockets of energy-sector shareholders with £tens-of-billions of what, in efficiency & delivery terms, is effectively an outdated and totally ineffective solution ...

The only thing that is related to JiT supply is the reality that when it's not managed correctly it results in a TFL (where F is a profanity!) mess ... the issue with smart-meters is that the project has taken so long that it's already missed the bus - it's a behind schedule, TFL project & those in control need to accept the 'egg on their faces' and pull the plug whilst there's still a prospect to stop wasting our money! :mad: (;):D)

HTH
Z

So the smart grid etc all more of a solution looking for a problem, or a justification of the spending of billions. Like the old Green Deal with over priced insulation. Smart meters are not going away, or do you think the targets will be quietly dropped.

EachPenny

nic_c wrote: »

So the smart grid etc all more of a solution looking for a problem, or a justification of the spending of billions. Like the old Green Deal with over priced insulation. Smart meters are not going away, or do you think the targets will be quietly dropped.

That process has already been started. The target is now only an 'offer' of a smart meter.

Now all they need to do is to make that a 'casual' offer, rather than agressive, misleading and bullying, and we'll be back to somewhere near normality where the customer should expect to receive a service from suppliers, rather than being misled by them.

zeupater

nic_c wrote: »

So the smart grid etc all more of a solution looking for a problem, or a justification of the spending of billions. Like the old Green Deal with over priced insulation. Smart meters are not going away, or do you think the targets will be quietly dropped.

Hi

The issue really goes back more than two decades & the background is relevant ....

The energy supply industry looked at developing meters which could be read remotely in order to reduce operating costs (meter reading & administration). To achieve this, the plan was to simply replace manual read meters with a basic form of smart-meter within the normal replacement timescales, with the roll-out costs being offset against operational savings ..... along comes the internet and the 'bean-counters' questioned the benefit of investing in infrastructure and more expensive meters when consumers could be encouraged to achieve similar savings at no cost to the industry by managing their accounts & submitting meter readings on-line ... result - project shelved!

In the early 2000s the EU latched onto the potential climate related advantages from managed energy use reduction and it's likely that a group of industry lobbyists applied their influence to steer towards a solution based on the resurrection of equipment designed for the previously shelved project with some 'minor' technical tweaking ... the seed is planted to grow a self-funded relatively cheap cost saving exercise and develop it into a project which, through poor management, became far more complex than necessary and, mainly due to the introduction of artificial timelines & unnecessary 'gold plating', hugely expensive ....

There is a problem, the effect of energy related emissions on the climate ... 15-20 years ago the combination of improving consumer information (/education) and providing the energy sector with the ability to employ TOU tariffs was seen as contributing towards the emissions reduction ... at that time it made sense to consider a cost justifiable solution.

The issue now is that events & technology have evolved rapidly, time have moved on and the opportunity window is closing (if not already closed!). If the project had been scoped to address (say) the highest 10% of energy consumers and the decision was made to fast-path the roll-out of smart-meters to this group instead of navel-gazing and spending vast sums on consultants, think-tanks, revisiting poorly scoped specifications etc, then we could have seen around a decade of advantage from a scheme which could have been delivered for a relatively small sum (couple of £billion?) and, importantly, within the available technology window ...

There's plenty of 'face-egg' to go around and those closely involved in the project know where it'll land and how quickly that will happen if/when the project is cancelled ... as it stands there's more intent to 'kick the can down the road' to protect reputations & career prospects than to prevent the wastage of consumer money ....

Do I "think the targets will be quietly dropped"? ... probably not, but they will continue to be manipulated & rescheduled & comparisons will continue to be incremental (/nett-change) as opposed to baseline ... the standard managed project creep strategy employed to wind-down & cover-up failing & failed projects ...

You can be sure that the final measure of success will look nothing like the original and that whatever is done will deliver success according to someone's definition ...

HTH
Z

zeupater

The_Big_Bamboo wrote: »

Brilliant!,....I enjoyed your post so much is there any chance you could do another one and factor 'domestic lighting' into your calculations as well? :j:D

Hi

You can see the overall effect within the reduction in the winter peak UK simultaneous electricity load as the red dotted line in the following report's 'security of supply' chart on page 17 ...
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/728374/UK_Energy_in_Brief_2018.pdf
... as a staged reduction of around 10GW between 2011/12 & 2017/18, that's about 17% so in line with the earlier example.

It's not all household related and definitely not all to do with LED TV & lightbulbs, but the correlation between the introduction & their anticipated theoretical aggregated effect would suggest that they're a (/the) major contributor ...

As a direct comparison, Table 4 (P22) of HMG's evidence check report on smart-metering ...
https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201617/cmselect/cmsctech/161/161.pdf
... suggests that various analysis of early testing conducted around the turn of this decade expected TOU & educational smart-meter savings on electricity to range from 6% to 9%, in the highly technical terms used in one summary "Up to 10% of peak load" ....

So, a project looking to reduce peak demand by ~7.5% (mean of 6&9) when fully implemented has been overtaken by technology & events that have already achieved well over double, at ~17% .... although the data can be massaged to incorporate non smart-meter related savings (such as LED technology) into project results in order to save face, logic dictates that you can't account for the same huge saved value twice and not expect it to be noticed by even the most innumerate amongst the politicians, the 'experts' & us! ...

HTH
Z

matelodave

I'm guessing that the savings from LED Tvs and lightbulbs will be significantly outweighed by charging up electric vehicles.

Can we expect the demand to start increasing again as we all transfer over to electric vehicles which will all be sitting overnight, each pulling multiple kwh out of the grid

Just imagine the scenario at around 6pm when people get home from work - plug in the car to get it charging, indoors, kettle on for a cuppa and then the oven and cooker to get the dinner on.

Or will we all be expected to go out and plug them in at around midnight to try and smooth the load a bit.

.

EachPenny

matelodave wrote: »

Just imagine the scenario at around 6pm when people get home from work - plug in the car to get it charging, indoors, kettle on for a cuppa and then the oven and cooker to get the dinner on.

Or will we all be expected to go out and plug them in at around midnight to try and smooth the load a bit.

That is really what the smart meters are for. As with swimming pools and water meters, it will become compulsory to have a smart meter and TOU tariff if you want to charge your EV. Or rather, it is likely to become compulsory for everyone to have a TOU tariff.

(not something I'd object to btw, I'm very happy with my E7)

ASavvyBuyer

matelodave wrote: »

Just imagine the scenario at around 6pm when people get home from work - plug in the car to get it charging, indoors, kettle on for a cuppa and then the oven and cooker to get the dinner on.

Or will we all be expected to go out and plug them in at around midnight to try and smooth the load a bit.

.

All the current EV I am aware of have built in timers for the chargers, so that they can take advantage of off-peak tariffs. You plug it in when convenient and the charger starts automatically at the times set.

zeupater

matelodave wrote: »

I'm guessing that the savings from LED Tvs and lightbulbs will be significantly outweighed by charging up electric vehicles.

Can we expect the demand to start increasing again as we all transfer over to electric vehicles which will all be sitting overnight, each pulling multiple kwh out of the grid

Just imagine the scenario at around 6pm when people get home from work - plug in the car to get it charging, indoors, kettle on for a cuppa and then the oven and cooker to get the dinner on.

Or will we all be expected to go out and plug them in at around midnight to try and smooth the load a bit.

.

Hi

There's been plenty of misinformation in the press about the effect of EVs on the grid, so much that about a year ago National Grid saw it necessary to counter what they considered as being misleading articles regarding additional generating capacity ...
http://fes.nationalgrid.com/media/1264/ev-myth-buster-v032.pdf

... in which their conclusion was ...

- The scenario which best fits the government’s statement is Two Degrees.

- The additional peak demand from EVs in that scenario is not 30 GW but more likely to be 5 GW.

Note that their scenario preferences were based around domestic smart-charging equipment (which is starting to hit the market!), offering capability & functionality not provided by smart-meters unless they're simply used to shed connected load at peak times! ...

HTH
Z

zeupater

EachPenny wrote: »

That is really what the smart meters are for. As with swimming pools and water meters, it will become compulsory to have a smart meter and TOU tariff if you want to charge your EV. Or rather, it is likely to become compulsory for everyone to have a TOU tariff.

(not something I'd object to btw, I'm very happy with my E7)

Hi

See above post, the current generation of smart-meters aren't smart enough and competent equipment to control & schedule EV charging on a networked communication basis is already available ...

HTH
Z

EachPenny

zeupater wrote: »

See above post, the current generation of smart-meters aren't smart enough and competent equipment to control & schedule EV charging on a networked communication basis is already available ...

As per the National Grid paper, the smart chargers (alongside other smart appliances) will work out when energy is cheapest and switch on and off as necessary. Smart meters are (in the Government's view) the key to delivery of TOU tariffs, even if the current technology is too 'thick' to do the job very well:-

This means that the chargers will be aware of how much electricity costs every hour of the day, they will know when you will require your car to be fully charged they will be controlled via the internet, etc. Also we see time of use tariffs being introduced to a greater extent. This is where the cost of electricity will vary throughout the day – the most expensive time is likely to be around peak time. Therefore, with smart chargers, charging will be, where possible, undertaken away from peak time. Why would anyone needlessly use electricity when it is most expensive?

Even as far back as 10 years ago I was going to meetings with Government departments and it was made clear a switch to EV's would require a TOU approach to become the norm.