Smart Meters

Another reason the energy industry wants everyone to get a smart meter is that the antiquated Radio Teleswitch system, which is transmitted from the Droitwich Radio 4 transmitter and still uses, wait for it, huge glass valves which the BBC cannot obtain any more - is due to be decommissioned/switched off in 2020. This was originally proposed to be 2017!

So any remaining Economy 7 teleswitches still in service post 2020 won't receive a signal telling them to turn on storage heating/DHW immersion heaters resulting in large numbers of angry consumers ranting to their energy providers they have had several days of cold showers.

So those of you who are anti-smart meter and have an old fashioned Economy 7 teleswitch - be careful what you wish for!


Edit - some links for those interested:

https://www.ofgem.gov.uk/ofgem-publications/86257/rtspresentation.pdf

https://www.theguardian.com/media/2011/oct/09/bbc-radio4-long-wave-goodbye

http://www.energynetworks.org/assets/files/news/consultation-responses/ENA%20Response%20to%20Consultation%20on%20RTS%20Future-with%20Appendix1.pdf

https://www.bbceng.info/Operations/transmitter_ops/Reminiscences/Droitwich/droitwich_calling.htm

brewerdave wrote: »

I think that the second sentence is more meaningful - firstly by repeating the myth of "immediate benefit to consumers" - and then going on about the real reason, "a flexible energy market" ie time of use charging!!

Hi

It actually goes much further than that ...

Ofgem themselves don't seem to follow their own guidelines ... take for example the totally irregular situation they create by including following conflicted information in a single communication ...

The letter states that there's a standard of conduct mandated requirement that all communications .... "must be complete, accurate and not misleading" before effectively breaching this requirement by stating that "Smart metering brings immediate benefits to consumers, helping them to take control of their energy usage ..." - obviously a claim that would be extremely hard to substantiate against their own conduct standard when applied to even a fractional subset of consumers and impossibly so when applied to consumers as a whole, especially so when considering that any benefits need to be offset against the project costs and their effects on those bill paying consumers ...

Obviously Ofgem themselves don't subscribe to ensuring that their own communications are "complete, accurate and not misleading" ... say's it all really, it's either a regulator conflicted in their understanding of their own brief, employ ineffective individuals or operate under serious political pressure to bulldoze through a project that has undoubtedly been misinterpreted, poorly scoped and totally mismanaged by both themselves and the energy sector as a whole.


HTH
Z

Hengus wrote: »

If we put the mess that is the rollout of UK smart meters to one side for a moment, the concept of smart metering and a smart grid makes a lot of sense for consumers. A sizeable chunk of our energy bills is down to the cost of having standby power generation available on a just-in-case basis. We also pay wind generators to feather the blades on their turbines when energy generation exceeds demand. The concept of trying to match supply and demand makes a lot of sense - particularly, when the cost of home battery storage falls to an economic level. A key part of this balancing act is 30 minute consumer usage profiling and time-of-use tariffs,

What doesn’t make any sense is the design and rollout of the UK smart meter programme. Were it not for the fact that the industry insisted on remote disconnection - which will never get used for legal and Health and Safety reasons - the need for GCHQ level cyber layered security would never have been needed.

Smart meter promotion is also deliberately misleading as the concept of pay today to save money tomorrow is alien to most consumers. The truth is that a smart meter and IHD will not save a consumer 1p unless the consumer changes his/her usage habits, What is also true is that a smart grid - of which smart meters are but a part - should lead to lower than they might have been bills in the future. For example, smart meters can report potential line faults such as over voltage so the cost of fault identification/rectification should fall. The cost of switching suppliers will fall and so on.

In sum, if the Government and Industry stopped treating consumers as idiots with asinine adverts based on Gaz and Leccy (I wonder where they have gone?) and entered into a mature debate about the costs and benefits of a smart grid, then the rollout of UK smart meters might be more generally accepted as being a good thing. Then again, if civil servants and industry cannot even run a railway, then what hope is there for a competently run smart grid.

Hengus I simply do not agree that they make sense for consumers or customers.

We can't put the debacle of the programme aside because it is we that are paying for it.

As far as I can see the hoped for benefits are for the energy industry.

The Supply and Demand argument is a part of doing business, every business has to assess how it can improve logistics or install kit to make things more efficient, but that is something they should be paying for because if they can't keep up with the demand they will get sacked.

They are happy to suck us dry with unjustifiable increases so they can pay huge dividents, but the shareholders and stakeholders of that business need to understand what investment is. They can't always have massive profits that are always higher than last year or last quarter.

This is what is wrong with the programme, because they are spending OUR money not shareholder funds they get away with a lot more crap. When a programme can't deliver on time you revisit the timescales, suspend it if necessary until the network or whatever other blocker is resolved. You do not install a bunch of kit (SMET1) that undermines the competition in the industry and is not fit for purpose. It is only because they have guaranteed access to our wallet, even if we use no energy at all that they get away with it.

It is quite typical for £99 per energy so £198 a year in standing charges, then in order to reduce these you have the cattle prod they give to other things that consume. Do what we say the way we say it, give us access to your bank account, to deduct whatever we see fit, even if we have thousands per consumer in overpayments we will not have to pay you back your own money for a month.

This whole industry is a bunch of unregulated scammers, I know OFGEM are supposed to be the regulator but they are just the PR dept for the energy companies, they are not fit for purpose either and have the same disease of spending other people's money.

You say the concept of pay today to save tomorrow is alien to consumers, well no, it is alien to shareholders who want a quick ever rising share. You are right about the IHD.

One of the stated goals was to make customers more aware of their energy use, well you could have achieved that by sending 2 sub £10 energy monitors to every household in the country and it would be less than just the WASTED money so far.

However, in the end there is only so much you can do, my usage is very very low, yet I still got into measuring what were the dodgy devices, I invested first in the monitor, I think it was this forum where I first heard of them. Then I looked at TV's, fridges and every power supply, then I got into just taking readings from my meters when I left at the same time each day.

I would test the impact of reducing the temperature of the water on my boiler over a month, then another month I looked at whether it was cheaper to heat the property quickly with a high temperature on boiler or to let it take longer, that was an expensive test.

In the end there is only so much you can do, I have got rid of bad devices but it is hard to get lower than the 3kWh a day average I have on power if I am actually to reside here. I have nothing on standby except the fridge, I have reduced the settings on that to the lowest possible within the parameters of keeping food safe to eat. It is an eco fridge and that buying decision was based on annual energy usage. Note I do not have a smart meter, nor was I even aware of them properly when I made these decisions, they were driven by costs.

Of course the smart meter promotion is deliberately misleading it has to be because it is all lies lies lies.

Reporting of line faults is a benefit to the industry, it is part of the SLA that they do all they need to do to keep the network functioning and safe. If Smart Meters help that then they need to invest or they risk being sacked.

All of the so called consumer benefits are hoped for but not tangible benefits because we are not seeing these passed on.

Do not get me started on Gaz and Leccy, I would be one of the firing squad for everyone involved or responsible for that awful campaign, but what do you expect, give Smart Energy GB over £50m a year to spend on advertising and that is what will happen

Look at this 248 page of hogwash

https://www.smartenergygb.org/en/~/media/SmartEnergy/essential-documents/essential-documents/english/Consumer-Engagement-Plan-and-budget-2017.ashx

This years is 62 pages

So these clowns say they have a LEGAL DUTY to achieve the following objectives,

Looking at the smart meter thread in this forum I think we can definitely say they have failed miserably in this. I spoke to someone the other day about why they got one and they told me they were threatened by energy company.

Nothing to do with Smart GB, they are just another not fit for purpose cog in the wheel of this project, here is what they were supposed to do:

1. Build consumer con!!!64257;dence in the installation of smart metering systems by gas and electricity suppliers.

2. Build consumer awareness and understanding of the use of smart metering systems (and the information obtained through them).

3. Increase the willingness of energy consumers to use smart metering systems to change their behaviour so as to enable them to reduce their consumption of energy.

4. Assist consumers with low incomes or prepayment meters, or consumers who may encounter additional barriers in being able to realise the bene!!!64257;ts of smart metering systems due to their particular circumstances or characteristics, to realise the bene!!!64257;ts of smart metering systems while continuing to maintain an adequate level of warmth and to meet their other energy needs.

If annoying the crap out of customers and misleading counts a 2 above then maybe they did that.

So who is responsible and why is it doomed to fail?

Well if course it is another part time "gig" with a board that is overladen with 9 members from the energy industry and a few "token" appointments that can easily be overridden and quite how the marketing Director of TFL can be said to be Representing the interests of energy consumers I do not know.

The Chairman is of course a marketing expert of many years standing, one could say he is independent of the energy industry but not of spending money on advertising.

The structure of the Smart Energy GB board is set out in the Standard Conditions of Electricity & Gas Supply, Electricity Distribution and Gas Transporter Licences (hereafter “the supplier licences”). The board’s membership is:

Independent Chair
• Mark Lund OBE

Part time gig main job is at McCann Worldgroup

https://uk.linkedin.com/in/mark-lund-obe-0b1ba042

Elected by and representing Relevant Suppliers (large energy suppliers with over 250,000 domestic customers)

E1. Jane Bednall (also Chief Marketing Officer, SSE)
E2. Jean Fiddes (also Head of Residential Sales & Retention, E.ON)
E3. Peter Simon (also Product & Propositions Director, British Gas)
E4.• Chris Thewlis (also Director of Customer Service & Sales, n.power)
E5.• Stephen Veal (also Energy Director, Utility Warehouse)
E6.• Shwezin Win (also Head of Value Creation for Smart Metering, EDF Energy)

Elected by and representing small domestic energy suppliers
E7.• Patrick New (also Retail Director, Ecotricity)

Elected by and representing non-domestic energy suppliers
E8.• Steve Mulinganie (also Regulation & Compliance Manager, Gazprom)
E9.• Lynn Morrison (also Head of Business Engagement, Opus Energy)

Nominated by Citizens Advice
C1. Victoria MacGregor (also Director of Energy, Citizens Advice England & Wales)
C2. James Taylor (also Head of Policy & Public Affairs, Scope)

Representing the interests of energy consumers
C3. Mervyn Kohler (also Special Adviser, Age UK)
C4. Chris Macleod (also Marketing Director, Transport for London)

These guys must have been rubbing their hands with glee, what a gig, spend over £100m of other people's money with no come back if you screw up, great for your CV and they get to spend over £3m on salaries and waste millions more. It is called networking my dear.

It seems that they lost the confidence of the customer back in 2015:

http://stopsmartmeters.org.uk/smart-energy-gb-communications-director-lies-to-public-live-on-bbc-one-breakfast/]

I've just read a "Promoted Content" article in the Saturday Times. Very pro meters, as you would expect I suppose.

One parts says "Some meters, such as the early Smets1, temporarily lose their functionality when you switch. The devices will all receive software upgrades in the next year to be on par with the second generation Smets 2. You won't have to do anything - it will be sent down the line."

Leaving aside the vagueness of saying that Smets1 units 'temporarily' lose functionality (what, seconds, minutes, months!!?), is this statement true - i.e. will an upgraded Smets1 have exactly the same functionality as a Smets2?

I suspect that they've chosen the wording 'on par' to imply that, which makes me suspicious.

Hengus wrote: »

It is not planned to upgrade SMETS1 meters to SMETS2.

Are you saying that the article is telling a deliberate lie? It's a pity that there isn't a contact email for the author of the article - Mike Pattenden "Technology Journalist".