Energy smart meter issues creating north-south divide

Gerry1

bob2302 said:

mmmmikey said:

bob2302 said:

I don't see why they don't create a standard device like the Octopus Mini, and allow it to report usage via broadband. The security concerns with metering aren't really about fraud and clearly there is no national security concern about devices that connect via zigbee and send through the internet because they already exist.  

On the face of it that sounds reasonable, but (a) it introduces a whole heap of support challenges about whether any issue is with the customer's internet connection or elsewhere, etc. and (b) the Octopus Mini type devices only deal with outgoing data and there is a need for an inbound connection as well.

None of this is straightforward :-)

It wouldn't need to accept incoming connection, it would just create a persistent outgoing connection - this is probably how the Mini works. Lots of software does this and it's very lightweight over UDP.

And that would break the entire raison d'être for Smart Meters !   It would never be allowed because customers could switch off the broadband connection, thereby defeating all the control features baked into the Smart Meter Specification e.g. Load Limiting and Load Shedding.

Ildhund

Gerry1 said:

And that would break the entire raison d'être for Smart Meters !   It would never be allowed because customers could switch off the broadband connection, thereby defeating all the control features baked into the Smart Meter Specification e.g. Load Limiting and Load Shedding.

... not to mention software and firmware updates, security updates, tariff updates, ToU matrix changes, ALCS switching time changes, along with tampering mitigation ...   

tim9333

When it came to who was going to roll out smart meters, there were two candidates
- the energy supplier that sends out your bill
- or the distribution company that operates the wires and gas pipes

The problem here is the structure of the industry
- Centrica, the owner of British Gas and the biggest supplier, didn't have a distribution company so would lose out on a business opportunity
- and only the supplier has a relationship with the customer. Most people don't know who their distribution company is

So Government ran with the Centrica argument and gave it to suppliers - this was their lobbying. It wasn't in the national interest  

Dieter Helm does make it look easy - make it a street by street roll out.

That would have been better but the Daily Mail hated Smart meters - that newspapers opposition has cost everyone on their bills through a massively increased cost of roll out