In message , at 16:58:25 on Wed, 1 Jul
2015, "Dave Plowman (News)" remarked:
What facilities does it have for doing things like switching off your
deep freeze temporarily when there's very high demand elsewhere, or only
powering up the dishwasher overnight?

How can a smart meter do that?

A good question. The proponents don't often explain how it's supposed to
work.

Would require a house rewire - or RF linked sockets scattered around
the place.

The latter is the only think likely to work in the short term. But often
the sockets for kitchen/laundry appliances are hugely inaccessible,
and/or if you stuck a wart in the socket behind, the appliance would
stick out two inches it the room.

Or the machines themselves controlled by Wi-Fi.

More likely something closer to Bluetooth, but in the absense of any
such appliances at the moment, this whole Smart Meter thing sounds likek
science fiction.
--
Roland Perry