micky wrote:

One of my friends sends me an email about a local state rep who is
preseinting to the Md. Public Service Commission a "case" to allow
people to reject smart meters.

Is there any reason to reject one?

The often-stated case for smart meters (for electricity) is that they
allow for time-of-use billing.

In other words, the cost of electricity changes during the course of a
day, and smart meters allow utility companies to more equitably charge
individual home owers for the electricity they use.

But this represents a false economy when applied on such a small scale
as the individual home.

The REAL unspoken reason for smart meters is that they save manpower
costs (meter-reading costs) for electric utilities.

The main problem is this:

Over the life of the meter, the meter will save the utility company
maybe $100 in meter-reading and other costs (remote turn on/off, etc).
However, this is offset by the up-front cost of buying the meter,
installing the network, billing software, etc. This cost (say, $500
over the life of the meter) will be borne by the home owner through
additional monthly fees.

The real savings (manpower mostly) will be enjoyed by the utility (say,
$100) at the expense of the home owner - a much larger expense (say,
$500) than the utility will gain.

Ordinarily, such a bargain in the commercial / retail marketplace is
more equitable.

For example, a consumer might pay a higher annual cost for one
credit-card over another, where the benefits of the card are perceived
to be worth the extra cost.

Utility companies want smart meters because they reduce their
meter-reading costs, plus they can do more with the meters (remote
disconnect/reconnect, offer pre-paid electicity service, etc).

The time-of-use aspect of billing for residential electricity is bogus.

Electric utilities that supply a given residential customer base always
recoup what they spend to buy electricity by charging the customer base
accordingly. There is no need to figure out, on a house-by-house basis,
who used how many kwh during 9-am to 5-pm (or what-ever). A total kwh
reading per month is sufficient. The differences in use patterns
between houses do not amount to anything worthy of spending $500 to
$1000 for a new meter and related billing infrastructure.

Again, time-of-use electricity billing for residential customers
represents a false economy, when the cost of the metering systems and
software are taken into account.

If those costs are borne mainly or exclusively by the home owner, then
only the utility company wins - and the home owner can never
realistically change their life-style to the point where they time-shift
enough of their electricity use to recoup the extra new costs of paying
for the meter that is imposed on them by the utility.

On 5/15/2012 7:33 AM, Home Guy wrote:
micky wrote:

One of my friends sends me an email about a local state rep who is
preseinting to the Md. Public Service Commission a "case" to allow
people to reject smart meters.

Is there any reason to reject one?

The often-stated case for smart meters (for electricity) is that they
allow for time-of-use billing.

In other words, the cost of electricity changes during the course of a
day, and smart meters allow utility companies to more equitably charge
individual home owers for the electricity they use.

But this represents a false economy when applied on such a small scale
as the individual home.

The REAL unspoken reason for smart meters is that they save manpower
costs (meter-reading costs) for electric utilities.

The main problem is this:

Over the life of the meter, the meter will save the utility company
maybe $100 in meter-reading and other costs (remote turn on/off, etc).
However, this is offset by the up-front cost of buying the meter,
installing the network, billing software, etc. This cost (say, $500
over the life of the meter) will be borne by the home owner through
additional monthly fees.

The real savings (manpower mostly) will be enjoyed by the utility (say,
$100) at the expense of the home owner - a much larger expense (say,
$500) than the utility will gain.

Ordinarily, such a bargain in the commercial / retail marketplace is
more equitable.

For example, a consumer might pay a higher annual cost for one
credit-card over another, where the benefits of the card are perceived
to be worth the extra cost.

Utility companies want smart meters because they reduce their
meter-reading costs, plus they can do more with the meters (remote
disconnect/reconnect, offer pre-paid electicity service, etc).

The time-of-use aspect of billing for residential electricity is bogus.

Electric utilities that supply a given residential customer base always
recoup what they spend to buy electricity by charging the customer base
accordingly. There is no need to figure out, on a house-by-house basis,
who used how many kwh during 9-am to 5-pm (or what-ever). A total kwh
reading per month is sufficient. The differences in use patterns
between houses do not amount to anything worthy of spending $500 to
$1000 for a new meter and related billing infrastructure.

Again, time-of-use electricity billing for residential customers
represents a false economy, when the cost of the metering systems and
software are taken into account.

If those costs are borne mainly or exclusively by the home owner, then
only the utility company wins - and the home owner can never
realistically change their life-style to the point where they time-shift
enough of their electricity use to recoup the extra new costs of paying
for the meter that is imposed on them by the utility.

again, you're mostly wrong

in the case where the home is generating power during the day, it is
critical to know which way power is going when.

in the case where you have a very new energy efficient home, it is
critical to know the difference in power being used between other nearby
homes when.

chaniarts wrote:

Is there any reason to reject one?

The REAL unspoken reason for smart meters is that they save
manpower costs (meter-reading costs) for electric utilities.

The real savings (manpower mostly) will be enjoyed by the utility
(say, $100) at the expense of the home owner - a much larger
expense (say, $500) than the utility will gain.

Utility companies want smart meters because they reduce their
meter-reading costs, plus they can do more with the meters
(remote disconnect/reconnect, offer pre-paid electicity service,
etc).

The time-of-use aspect of billing for residential electricity is
bogus.

Time-of-use electricity billing for residential customers represents
a false economy, when the cost of the metering systems and software
are taken into account.

The home owner can never realistically change their life-style to
the point where they time-shift enough of their electricity use to
recoup the extra new costs of paying for the meter that is imposed
on them by the utility.

again, you're mostly wrong

But you won't speak to these facts will you:

- Utilities are installing meters at the customer's expense that
will cost customers 4 to 8 times what the utility will save
in reduced operating costs (meter-reading mostly).

- home owners are unlikely to shift electricity usage or change
lifestyle to compensate for extra charges designed to cover
the cost of the meter, billing systems, etc.

- Utilities want smart meters to reduce manpower costs (meter
reading, automated connect / disconnect, new services such as
pay-as-you-go, pre-paid use, etc). The utilities are not willing
to pay the full up-front cost of new meters out of their operating
profit, and so they use politics to force new meters on residential
customers AND get new / additional tarrifs or fees imposed on monthly
bills so that customers bankroll the new meters, billing systems, etc.

Now I will address you extremely weak counter-arguments:

in the case where the home is generating power during the day, it
is critical to know which way power is going when.

A very big piece of horse-****. Why?

Because any customer co-gen system will by law have it's own meter and
will feed any power generated by the system back into the grid through
that meter. What-ever meter the customer has for his existing
residential load would remain in-place.

And a second reason why your example is horse-**** is simply the
numbers. The numbers of residential co-gen systems (solar or wind) is
EXTREMELY small, and hardly a factor when considering why TOU meters are
being deployed for residential use.

in the case where you have a very new energy efficient home, it
is critical to know the difference in power being used between
other nearby homes when.

Again, here's where you don't understand what's going on.

If I have an energy-efficient home, I'm already going to use fewer KWH
compared to my neighbor. So if we were both billed only on total
monthly KWH, I would use less electricity, and my bill would be lower
than my neighbor.

Now, if I and my neighbor both have TOU meters and we are billed based
on TOU rates, then if the percentage break-down of our usage is the
same, then there is no advantage to TOU measurements and billing. If we
both consume 25% of our total KWH during prime-time, and 75% of the rest
at "cheap-time", then it makes no difference if we are billed based on
TOU or by flat-rate.

Now if I shift any percentage of my prime-time use to cheap-time, then I
would theoretically benefit if I'm billed under TOU vs flat-rate. The
more I shift, the more I benefit. - The more my house is energy
efficient, the LESS I benefit. !!

Now, do the math.

Regardless if your house is energy efficient or not.

Unless you are willing to consume NO electricity during prime time, you
will not save enough under TOU metering to compensate for the additional
charges the utility is saddling you with to pay for the ****ing meter in
the first place.

That is why it's a false economy.

Same for hybrid or electric cars. An electric car *might* cost you less
to operate on a per-mile basis, but the up-front cost of the batteries
will far exceed the operational savings. It's a false economy.

Home Guy wrote:
micky wrote:

One of my friends sends me an email about a local state rep who is
preseinting to the Md. Public Service Commission a "case" to allow
people to reject smart meters.

Is there any reason to reject one?

The often-stated case for smart meters (for electricity) is that they
allow for time-of-use billing.

In other words, the cost of electricity changes during the course of a
day, and smart meters allow utility companies to more equitably charge
individual home owers for the electricity they use.

But this represents a false economy when applied on such a small scale
as the individual home.

The REAL unspoken reason for smart meters is that they save manpower
costs (meter-reading costs) for electric utilities.

The main problem is this:

Over the life of the meter, the meter will save the utility company
maybe $100 in meter-reading and other costs (remote turn on/off, etc).
However, this is offset by the up-front cost of buying the meter,
installing the network, billing software, etc. This cost (say, $500
over the life of the meter) will be borne by the home owner through
additional monthly fees.

The real savings (manpower mostly) will be enjoyed by the utility
(say, $100) at the expense of the home owner - a much larger expense
(say, $500) than the utility will gain.

Ordinarily, such a bargain in the commercial / retail marketplace is
more equitable.

For example, a consumer might pay a higher annual cost for one
credit-card over another, where the benefits of the card are perceived
to be worth the extra cost.

Utility companies want smart meters because they reduce their
meter-reading costs, plus they can do more with the meters (remote
disconnect/reconnect, offer pre-paid electicity service, etc).

The time-of-use aspect of billing for residential electricity is
bogus.

Electric utilities that supply a given residential customer base
always recoup what they spend to buy electricity by charging the
customer base accordingly. There is no need to figure out, on a
house-by-house basis, who used how many kwh during 9-am to 5-pm (or
what-ever). A total kwh reading per month is sufficient. The
differences in use patterns between houses do not amount to anything
worthy of spending $500 to $1000 for a new meter and related billing
infrastructure.

Again, time-of-use electricity billing for residential customers
represents a false economy, when the cost of the metering systems and
software are taken into account.

If those costs are borne mainly or exclusively by the home owner, then
only the utility company wins - and the home owner can never
realistically change their life-style to the point where they
time-shift enough of their electricity use to recoup the extra new
costs of paying for the meter that is imposed on them by the utility.

I know maths is hard, but let's see if we can figure this out:

Let's assume a manual meter-read can read, oh, one meter every three
minutes.

At $20/hr, all things considered, it costs the power company about $1/month
to read your meter.

A "smart" meter costs about $200 and about $40 worth of labor to install it.

So, then, for all that, the power company will recoup the expense for buying
and installing the meter in 240 months, about 20 years.

Obviously the power company can't make economic sense with this scenario. I
guess that's why they're charging me a few bucks per month for this shiny
new meter.

Aside:
The power distribution company DID come out and test the pole in my backyard
recently. They dug an access hole about 18" deep around it and bored out a
1/2" plug of wood. I don't know what they did with the plug - maybe sent it
to a lab for testing - but they did nail an aluminum plate about the size of
a fifty-cent piece to the pole with the test date on it.

The power company employee did say he thought the pole in my yard was okay -
it was one of the older ones pressure treated with creosote. It should last
sixty years he opined. He further said the newer poles, those treated with
eco-friendly materials (like extract of arugula), rot out in about a week.

HeyBub wrote:

At $20/hr, all things considered, it costs the power company about
$1/month to read your meter.

A "smart" meter costs about $200 and about $40 worth of labor to
install it.

I don't buy your estimated price of $200.

So, then, for all that, the power company will recoup the expense
for buying and installing the meter in 240 months, about 20 years.

Obviously the power company can't make economic sense with this
scenario.

No - that's why they have added either completely new line-items on your
bill, or have increased existing ones.

I guess that's why they're charging me a few bucks per month for
this shiny new meter.

And now tell me how that's working out for the customer.

Aside:

(stuff about a pole)

What's that got to do with this discussion?

Home Guy wrote:
HeyBub wrote:

At $20/hr, all things considered, it costs the power company about
$1/month to read your meter.

A "smart" meter costs about $200 and about $40 worth of labor to
install it.

I don't buy your estimated price of $200.


So, how much do YOU think they cost?

"Various kinds of smart meters are available and in use around the country.
Depending on its capabilities, a smart meter - at a cost of about $200 per
home - also can play a role in how much information about energy use is made
available to customers and how much money can be saved."
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24459145...ectricity-use/



Aside:

(stuff about a pole)

What's that got to do with this discussion?

My apologies. Nothing if all we're discussing are meters; that's why I
prefaced the observation with "Aside". Next time I'll use "OT" instead of
"Aside" so you won't nearly twitch to death.

"HeyBub" wrote:

-snip-

I know maths is hard, but let's see if we can figure this out:

Let's assume a manual meter-read can read, oh, one meter every three
minutes.

Not in my neck of the woods he can't-- and I'm just in the burbs. In
rural areas he might drive 5 minutes between meters.


At $20/hr, all things considered, it costs the power company about $1/month
to read your meter.

$20/hr? I'll bet it is closer to $100 "all things considered" --
oh, and don't forget the other $100 for the truck he's driving.


A "smart" meter costs about $200 and about $40 worth of labor to install it.

So, then, for all that, the power company will recoup the expense for buying
and installing the meter in 240 months, about 20 years.

Obviously the power company can't make economic sense with this scenario. I
guess that's why they're charging me a few bucks per month for this shiny
new meter.

There are a ton of 'hidden costs' buried in my electric bill-- but the
meter isn't one of them.


Aside:
The power distribution company DID come out and test the pole in my backyard
recently. They dug an access hole about 18" deep around it and bored out a
1/2" plug of wood. I don't know what they did with the plug - maybe sent it
to a lab for testing - but they did nail an aluminum plate about the size of
a fifty-cent piece to the pole with the test date on it.
-snip-
Never heard of that one. I'll bet in NY, some guy would come out and
eyeball it from the street and tell you to replace it.

Jim

Jim Elbrecht wrote:


Aside:
The power distribution company DID come out and test the pole in my
backyard recently. They dug an access hole about 18" deep around it
and bored out a 1/2" plug of wood. I don't know what they did with
the plug - maybe sent it to a lab for testing - but they did nail an
aluminum plate about the size of a fifty-cent piece to the pole with
the test date on it.
-snip-
Never heard of that one. I'll bet in NY, some guy would come out and
eyeball it from the street and tell you to replace it.


Sounds like your power company uses the "Necessary Pole Management" system.
When the pole falls over, they replace it.

In my neighborhood, Houston, we had a hurricane four years ago (Hurricane
Yikes). The electrical distribution system was so dilapidated that four
million people were without power for up to ten days! Since then, the local
power distribution company has been beavering away to upgrade and rigorously
maintain the system. It seems like once a month, some tree-trimming truck
comes by whacks the bejesus out of everthing taller than a rose bush.

On Wed, 16 May 2012 07:42:10 -0400, Jim Elbrecht
wrote:

"HeyBub" wrote:

-snip-

I know maths is hard, but let's see if we can figure this out:

Let's assume a manual meter-read can read, oh, one meter every three
minutes.

Maybe in an apartment building basement he can do that.

Not in my neck of the woods he can't-- and I'm just in the burbs. In
rural areas he might drive 5 minutes between meters.

I live in a townhouse, and even here I think 3 minutes is unlikely,
even wiithout goofing off. At my house he'd have to move things out
of his way, garbage cans, etc, then squeeze past the motorcycle (1 or
2 minutes) then remove the old one (1 minute) and put in the new one
(1 minute) , then go back to the truck to get another meter (2
minutes, 3 if has to unlock/lock the truck) then go to the next house
1 minute. And he will probably relax for 30 seconds between meters.

So I think we're talking 6 to 9 minutes/meter. Not much more for
single family houses in small to modertate sized lots, except he has
longer to walk to the truck and has to move it more often.


At $20/hr, all things considered, it costs the power company about $1/month
to read your meter.

$20/hr? I'll bet it is closer to $100 "all things considered" --
oh, and don't forget the other $100 for the truck he's driving.


A "smart" meter costs about $200 and about $40 worth of labor to install it.

So, then, for all that, the power company will recoup the expense for buying
and installing the meter in 240 months, about 20 years.

Obviously the power company can't make economic sense with this scenario. I
guess that's why they're charging me a few bucks per month for this shiny
new meter.

There are a ton of 'hidden costs' buried in my electric bill-- but the
meter isn't one of them.


Aside:
The power distribution company DID come out and test the pole in my backyard
recently. They dug an access hole about 18" deep around it and bored out a
1/2" plug of wood. I don't know what they did with the plug - maybe sent it
to a lab for testing - but they did nail an aluminum plate about the size of
a fifty-cent piece to the pole with the test date on it.
-snip-
Never heard of that one. I'll bet in NY, some guy would come out and
eyeball it from the street and tell you to replace it.

Jim

On 5/16/2012 2:23 PM, micky wrote:
On Wed, 16 May 2012 07:42:10 -0400, Jim
wrote:

wrote:

-snip-

I know maths is hard, but let's see if we can figure this out:

Let's assume a manual meter-read can read, oh, one meter every three
minutes.

Maybe in an apartment building basement he can do that.

Not in my neck of the woods he can't-- and I'm just in the burbs. In
rural areas he might drive 5 minutes between meters.

I live in a townhouse, and even here I think 3 minutes is unlikely,
even wiithout goofing off. At my house he'd have to move things out
of his way, garbage cans, etc, then squeeze past the motorcycle (1 or
2 minutes) then remove the old one (1 minute) and put in the new one
(1 minute) , then go back to the truck to get another meter (2
minutes, 3 if has to unlock/lock the truck) then go to the next house
1 minute. And he will probably relax for 30 seconds between meters.

So I think we're talking 6 to 9 minutes/meter. Not much more for
single family houses in small to modertate sized lots, except he has
longer to walk to the truck and has to move it more often.


At $20/hr, all things considered, it costs the power company about $1/month
to read your meter.

$20/hr? I'll bet it is closer to $100 "all things considered" --
oh, and don't forget the other $100 for the truck he's driving.


A "smart" meter costs about $200 and about $40 worth of labor to install it.

So, then, for all that, the power company will recoup the expense for buying
and installing the meter in 240 months, about 20 years.

Obviously the power company can't make economic sense with this scenario. I
guess that's why they're charging me a few bucks per month for this shiny
new meter.

There are a ton of 'hidden costs' buried in my electric bill-- but the
meter isn't one of them.


Aside:
The power distribution company DID come out and test the pole in my backyard
recently. They dug an access hole about 18" deep around it and bored out a
1/2" plug of wood. I don't know what they did with the plug - maybe sent it
to a lab for testing - but they did nail an aluminum plate about the size of
a fifty-cent piece to the pole with the test date on it.
-snip-
Never heard of that one. I'll bet in NY, some guy would come out and
eyeball it from the street and tell you to replace it.

Jim


i live in a town of 32 square miles with about 2600 residences of all
kinds (houses, ranches, apartments, businesses). it used to take about 8
days by a few people to read all the water meters manually. the town
replaced them all with remote read meters (radio based), and it can be
done in about 1 day by 1 person just by driving down the street.

most of the remote read electric meters being discussed here are
readable without ANY labor costs, as they can be polled from the utility
computers directly.

chaniarts wrote:

most of the remote read electric meters being discussed here are
readable without ANY labor costs, as they can be polled from the
utility computers directly.

And if the utility gets home owners to foot the entire bill for the
meters, computers and software, then in this equation we have customers
forking over $500 over the lifespan of the meter just so the utility can
save $100 in meter-reading costs over the same period.

Brilliant economics there.

The often-stated case for smart meters (for electricity) is that they
allow for time-of-use billing.

I thought one of the cases for smart meters was that they allowed
the utility to avoid having to build more generating capacity for
peak loads and replace it with "greenouts": shutting off heavy loads
in a house such as heating/air conditioning, water heaters, clothes
washers/ dryers, etc. without shutting off the whole house. It's
also one of the reasons for "smart appliances". This probably saves
the utility a lot of money. It still amounts to Unreliable Service(tm)
but they get to call it something else.

What they don't tell you is that the time they will shut off the air
conditioning is when it's 87 inside (with the thermostat set something
lower, it doesn't really matter how much lower because the A/C can't
keep up) and 108 outside (yes, this is in Texas).

In other words, the cost of electricity changes during the course of a
day, and smart meters allow utility companies to more equitably charge
individual home owers for the electricity they use.

TXU is now advertising a plan you can switch to "nights are free".
I think it's more of a gimmick to get people to switch electric
providers than anything else. But anyone taking that plan will
want to switch optional use (like clothes washers/dryers) to whatever
hours are considered "night".


But this represents a false economy when applied on such a small scale
as the individual home.

The REAL unspoken reason for smart meters is that they save manpower
costs (meter-reading costs) for electric utilities.

I think removing the need to build generating capacity saves them more.

On Sat, 26 May 2012 10:12:11 -0500, (Gordon
Burditt) wrote:

The often-stated case for smart meters (for electricity) is that they
allow for time-of-use billing.

I thought one of the cases for smart meters was that they allowed
the utility to avoid having to build more generating capacity for
peak loads and replace it with "greenouts": shutting off heavy loads
in a house such as heating/air conditioning, water heaters, clothes
washers/ dryers, etc. without shutting off the whole house. It's
also one of the reasons for "smart appliances". This probably saves
the utility a lot of money. It still amounts to Unreliable Service(tm)
but they get to call it something else.

No, smart METERS cannot do that.
What they don't tell you is that the time they will shut off the air
conditioning is when it's 87 inside (with the thermostat set something
lower, it doesn't really matter how much lower because the A/C can't
keep up) and 108 outside (yes, this is in Texas).

A smart METER cannot selectively shut off, or shed, loads. A smart
"center" can (load center - or service panel)

In other words, the cost of electricity changes during the course of a
day, and smart meters allow utility companies to more equitably charge
individual home owers for the electricity they use.

TXU is now advertising a plan you can switch to "nights are free".
I think it's more of a gimmick to get people to switch electric
providers than anything else. But anyone taking that plan will
want to switch optional use (like clothes washers/dryers) to whatever
hours are considered "night".

As we now do with the 3 level charging - run the heavy, optional stuff
in the low charge "night" period.

But this represents a false economy when applied on such a small scale
as the individual home.

Not if every home does the same thing. It can ammount to several large
power stations not needing to be built.
The REAL unspoken reason for smart meters is that they save manpower
costs (meter-reading costs) for electric utilities.

At the cost of significant investment in technology - so no, I have
to disagree that it is "the REAL" reason. Remote reading could be
added to a standard meter, or "customer read" with quarterly or
by-annual "agent read" to verify honesty can also be used - and have
been in several areas.
I think removing the need to build generating capacity saves them more.

Most definitely.

I thought one of the cases for smart meters was that they allowed
the utility to avoid having to build more generating capacity for
peak loads and replace it with "greenouts": shutting off heavy loads
in a house such as heating/air conditioning, water heaters, clothes
washers/ dryers, etc. without shutting off the whole house. It's
also one of the reasons for "smart appliances". This probably saves
the utility a lot of money. It still amounts to Unreliable Service(tm)
but they get to call it something else.

No, smart METERS cannot do that.

TXU (in Texas) claims that a smart thermostat they sell communicates
with the smart meter and allows you (via their web page) or them
to shut off your A/C for what they claim will be 15 to 45 minutes
during peak load periods. It's been available for at least a year.
I don't have one so I haven't seen it work, or know how often the
turnoff is used. But customers can (have to?) use the web page to
program the thermostat, so the remote setting ability has to work
even if it's not used against the wishes of the customer (yet).

I have seen working the web page that shows you readings of consumption
every 15 minutes, with the latest reading 24-48 hours old. (In other
words, on day X at 12:01AM, the readings for day X-2 appear).

What they don't tell you is that the time they will shut off the air
conditioning is when it's 87 inside (with the thermostat set something
lower, it doesn't really matter how much lower because the A/C can't
keep up) and 108 outside (yes, this is in Texas).

A smart METER cannot selectively shut off, or shed, loads. A smart
"center" can (load center - or service panel)

The load center is inside each smart appliance. If it's got some
sort of electronic timer or thermostat it has to have a way for a
low-power signal to switch the heavy-power-consumption part on and
off anyway. Or, in the case of heating/air conditioning, inside
the smart web-enabled thermostat. The smart meter here is being
used as a communication interface.

A smart METER can also act as a communications conduit between your
electric company and your appliances (many of these meters in the
USA use Zigbee radio for the last hop) and therefore let the electric
company tell your appliances to shut off. The same applies to the
smart thermostat that they are selling, but it can also not only
turn it on or off, but change the temperature setting.

TXU also has a portion on its smart meter web page where you can
register up to 5 "HAN" (Home Area Network) devices associated with
your meter. I'd love to see a sample of what people with these
devices can get on the web page.

I'm *hoping* that there is a little security in this, so the electric
company won't talk (via smart meter) to any devices on your meter
besides the ones with the MAC addresses you have registered. It
also lets you claim your devices and the guy in the apartment next
door (with the meter 1 foot from yours on the outside wall) claim
his. That's no protection against something that passively listens,
though. I'm also pretty sure that there's something in the design
that allows the electric company to see any HAN device broadcasting
data close to the meter, registered or not.

Apparently by registering the device, you can get statistics from
that device - run times, perhaps even power used, integrated into
the web page. Of course, the electric company gets these also.
You get to give the device a "friendly" name like "clothes washer",
"bedroom AC window unit" or whatever. I suspect that the HAN
interface includes something that allows asking "what are you?" and
getting back device type, manufacturer, model, version, and other
info. That's been available for USB, PCI, and lots of other computer
peripherals for years.


In other words, the cost of electricity changes during the course of a
day, and smart meters allow utility companies to more equitably charge
individual home owers for the electricity they use.

It doesn't really do that much good unless the individual home
owners *KNOW* about the changing prices and *REACT* to it. If you
make it too confusing, they won't. Certain proposals for
traffic-load-sensitive tolls on toll roads have this problem. I
haven't heard anything definite (there should be signs at the
entrance to the toll road) indicating that the per-mile toll charge
is less than the value of the pink slip on my car.

TXU is now advertising a plan you can switch to "nights are free".
I think it's more of a gimmick to get people to switch electric
providers than anything else. But anyone taking that plan will
want to switch optional use (like clothes washers/dryers) to whatever
hours are considered "night".

I wonder what TXU would do if someone, or a few people, started
abusing the hell out of this: they spend 8 hours of "night" charging
batteries (free), and disconnect after that, then spend 16 hours
of "day" using no grid power and discharging the batteries. (There's
still a customer charge of something like $5, so the monthly bill
won't quite be zero). Would they object, or encourage them?

As we now do with the 3 level charging - run the heavy, optional stuff
in the low charge "night" period.

But this represents a false economy when applied on such a small scale
as the individual home.

Not if every home does the same thing. It can ammount to several large
power stations not needing to be built.
The REAL unspoken reason for smart meters is that they save manpower
costs (meter-reading costs) for electric utilities.

At the cost of significant investment in technology - so no, I have
to disagree that it is "the REAL" reason. Remote reading could be
added to a standard meter,

I believe the local *water* utility has done this. They may still have
to drive down the street once a month.

or "customer read" with quarterly or
by-annual "agent read" to verify honesty can also be used - and have
been in several areas.
I think removing the need to build generating capacity saves them more.

Most definitely.

"Gordon Burditt" wrote in message
netamerica...
I thought one of the cases for smart meters was that they allowed
the utility to avoid having to build more generating capacity for
peak loads and replace it with "greenouts": shutting off heavy loads
in a house such as heating/air conditioning, water heaters, clothes
washers/ dryers, etc. without shutting off the whole house. It's
also one of the reasons for "smart appliances". This probably saves
the utility a lot of money. It still amounts to Unreliable Service(tm)
but they get to call it something else.

No, smart METERS cannot do that.

TXU (in Texas) claims that a smart thermostat they sell communicates
with the smart meter and allows you (via their web page) or them
to shut off your A/C for what they claim will be 15 to 45 minutes
during peak load periods. It's been available for at least a year.
I don't have one so I haven't seen it work, or know how often the
turnoff is used. But customers can (have to?) use the web page to
program the thermostat, so the remote setting ability has to work
even if it's not used against the wishes of the customer (yet).

In our part of Texas the service also has a monthly fee unrelated to the
cost of providing the service.

snip

Not if every home does the same thing. It can ammount to several large
power stations not needing to be built.
The REAL unspoken reason for smart meters is that they save manpower
costs (meter-reading costs) for electric utilities.

At the cost of significant investment in technology - so no, I have
to disagree that it is "the REAL" reason. Remote reading could be
added to a standard meter, or "customer read" with quarterly or
by-annual "agent read" to verify honesty can also be used - and have
been in several areas.

Cost of smart meters in this area are an add on, monthly, line item fee to
the customer bill.

No real savings because the other meters (gas and water) are still read
manually.

I also expect the fee to remain long after the cost of the meter is
recoverd.

NotMe wrote:

Cost of smart meters in this area are an add on, monthly, line item
fee to the customer bill.

See?

I told you so.

I told you people that these new smart-meters are costing home-owners an
extra $250 - $500 over the course of the life of the meter, while
conveying a $100 benefit in manpower cost-reduction to the utilities.
That's why it's a false economy.

If given the choice, I'd gladly make a one-time $100 payment to my
utility to pay for meter-reading for the next 10 years if it meant that
they didn't tack on an extra $5 a month for the "privledge" or "benefit"
of a smart meter.

No real savings because the other meters (gas and water) are still
read manually.

It's coming.

Mark my words - smart gas meters are coming. And they'll spin some
crock-of-**** argument for the need for time-of-use metering for natural
gas as the reason why it's needed for the residential market, when they
(just like the electric utilities) just want to reduce their
meter-reading costs - and not much else.

I also expect the fee to remain long after the cost of the meter
is recoverd.

Smart meters are more expensive - and have about half the life of
conventional analog wheel meters.

But those pesky software companies will charge utilites a fortune for
"needed" updates for the billing software for these smart meters. It's
a cash-cow for them too.

On 5/27/2012 1:37 AM, NotMe wrote:


snip

Not if every home does the same thing. It can ammount to several large
power stations not needing to be built.
The REAL unspoken reason for smart meters is that they save manpower
costs (meter-reading costs) for electric utilities.

At the cost of significant investment in technology - so no, I have
to disagree that it is "the REAL" reason. Remote reading could be
added to a standard meter, or "customer read" with quarterly or
by-annual "agent read" to verify honesty can also be used - and have
been in several areas.

Cost of smart meters in this area are an add on, monthly, line item fee to
the customer bill.


No additional charge here.


No real savings because the other meters (gas and water) are still read
manually.


Our gas supplier previously fitted remote readers on the registers of
inside meters. Then maybe 4 years ago they retrofitted all of them.
There is no additional charge. The water utility put remote readers on
meters maybe 5 years ago. No additional charge for that either.


I also expect the fee to remain long after the cost of the meter is
recoverd.

"George" wrote in message
...
On 5/27/2012 1:37 AM, NotMe wrote:


snip

Not if every home does the same thing. It can ammount to several large
power stations not needing to be built.
The REAL unspoken reason for smart meters is that they save manpower
costs (meter-reading costs) for electric utilities.

At the cost of significant investment in technology - so no, I have
to disagree that it is "the REAL" reason. Remote reading could be
added to a standard meter, or "customer read" with quarterly or
by-annual "agent read" to verify honesty can also be used - and have
been in several areas.

Cost of smart meters in this area are an add on, monthly, line item fee
to
the customer bill.


No additional charge here.


No real savings because the other meters (gas and water) are still read
manually.


Our gas supplier previously fitted remote readers on the registers of
inside meters. Then maybe 4 years ago they retrofitted all of them. There
is no additional charge. The water utility put remote readers on meters
maybe 5 years ago. No additional charge for that either.


I also expect the fee to remain long after the cost of the meter is
recoverd.


dig deeper it's there but perhaps not as a line item.

Recall phone company charged and still do for touch tone service when it was
actually cheaper for them to use touch tone than dial pulse.

On Sun, 27 May 2012 00:37:26 -0500, "NotMe" wrote:




snip

Not if every home does the same thing. It can ammount to several large
power stations not needing to be built.
The REAL unspoken reason for smart meters is that they save manpower
costs (meter-reading costs) for electric utilities.

At the cost of significant investment in technology - so no, I have
to disagree that it is "the REAL" reason. Remote reading could be
added to a standard meter, or "customer read" with quarterly or
by-annual "agent read" to verify honesty can also be used - and have
been in several areas.

Cost of smart meters in this area are an add on, monthly, line item fee to
the customer bill.

No real savings because the other meters (gas and water) are still read
manually.

I also expect the fee to remain long after the cost of the meter is
recoverd.

Don't know about where you are, but here in Waterloo the 3 meters were
read by 3 meter readers before the smart hydro and remote water meters
were installed. Waterloo North Hydro, Union Gas, and City of Waterloo
for Water.

I believe Kitchener had only one or 2 - as water and gas were both
Kitchener Utilities, while electric was Kitchener Wilmot Hydro

wrote:

Don't know about where you are, but here in Waterloo the 3 meters
were read by 3 meter readers before the smart hydro and remote
water meters were installed.

Where I am (a relatively large city near you) we have (or - had) 2 meter
readers.

One for electicity and water, and one for gas. Our electicity and water
are billed on the same bill.

Our water meters were changed last year and now they are read via some
sort of RF/wireless radio link (not quite sure how that works). So now,
nobody comes by to read either the electricity or the water.

I think it was a dumb/stupid idea to do that for water, since we still
have union gas doing manual meter-reading so why not simply combine that
(ie - have the same person read both the gas and water meters).

Now, here's another twist on this issue of remote meter reading:

It's been said that "facility monitoring" is (or was) a BIG part of
having someone come by to read the meters.

In other words, when a human is coming by to read a meter every month,
what they're also accomplishing is making sure that nobody has tampered
with the meter or the hook-up.

So utilities that have switched to smart-meters to reduce manpower costs
still have to deploy people to check on the equipment and hookups from
time to time.

Again, smart meters = false economy.

Gordon Burditt wrote:

The often-stated case for smart meters (for electricity) is that
they allow for time-of-use billing.

I thought one of the cases for smart meters was that they allowed
the utility to avoid having to build more generating capacity for
peak loads and replace it with "greenouts":

The answer to that depends on how your electricity infrastructure is
constructed on a corporate level.

Some (or many, or most?) utilities just maintain a local distribution
grid and don't actually generate any power themselves - they just
purchase power for re-distribution to their customers.

The north-american power grid is large enough, and diverse enough, to be
about to (a) always have spare capacity somewhere on the grid, and (b)
be able to move that spare capacity around so it gets to those that need
it, when they need it.

The free market (such as it is) has resulted in new,
privately-owned/operated plants (mostly powered by natural gas) to be
built and connected to the grid to supply "peak" demand power when and
where needed. And the owners are compensated accordingly by charging
very high rates.

I've never bought into the idea that there wasn't (or wouldn't be)
enough electricity supply to meet demand. At least not in eastern part
of north-america.

Now, perhaps there have been issues with there not being enough wire (or
big-enough wire) to carry this demand, but that's a different story.

I think removing the need to build generating capacity saves them
more.

Regardless who builds new plants: If the premis is that these costs ARE
ALWAYS FULLY RECOUPED during operation (and then result in a profit for
the owner/operator) - then what you just said doesn't make any sense.

On 5/27/2012 8:59 AM, Home Guy wrote:
....

I've never bought into the idea that there wasn't (or wouldn't be)
enough electricity supply to meet demand. At least not in eastern part
of north-america.
....

Well, if you force enough large-scale generation (coal-fired baseload
plants) offline at one time owing to onerous regulation it's quite
possible there won't be sufficient time to have alternative generation
online to provide the necessary margins for peak loading.

So much of the recent additions to the grid is non-reliable sourced
(wind/solar) so there's a pretty large risk.

IMO the use of natural gas, while currently plentiful, for
central-station generation is an egregious error in judgment for the
longer term.

--

dpb wrote:

IMO the use of natural gas, while currently plentiful, for
central-station generation is an egregious error in judgment
for the longer term.

I agree, because natural gas should be used for residential / commercial
heating in the winter - not to generate electricity to run air
conditioners in the summer.

Because when the natural gas runs low (10 years, 50 years from now)
there's going to be a calamity to try to figure out how to keep people
warm in the winter...

On Sun, 27 May 2012 12:36:40 -0400, Home Guy wrote:

dpb wrote:

IMO the use of natural gas, while currently plentiful, for
central-station generation is an egregious error in judgment
for the longer term.

I agree, because natural gas should be used for residential / commercial
heating in the winter - not to generate electricity to run air
conditioners in the summer.

Because when the natural gas runs low (10 years, 50 years from now)
there's going to be a calamity to try to figure out how to keep people
warm in the winter...

Right, and oil should be used for transportation. Everyone knows that coal is
a better fuel for electricity!

The often-stated case for smart meters (for electricity) is that
they allow for time-of-use billing.

I thought one of the cases for smart meters was that they allowed
the utility to avoid having to build more generating capacity for
peak loads and replace it with "greenouts":

The answer to that depends on how your electricity infrastructure is
constructed on a corporate level.

Some (or many, or most?) utilities just maintain a local distribution
grid and don't actually generate any power themselves - they just
purchase power for re-distribution to their customers.

The north-american power grid is large enough, and diverse enough, to be
about to (a) always have spare capacity somewhere on the grid, and (b)
be able to move that spare capacity around so it gets to those that need
it, when they need it.

Please explain the existence of "rolling blackouts", then. It happened
in Texas during both peak load times in the summer, and in the winter when
the excuse was that some of the plants on standby had some equipment freeze
or fail when they were needed.

If you get a chance, please read the book "1984" by George Orwell. It
explains a bit about the constant shortages, and why the system can't meet
everyone's needs.

Christopher A. Young
Learn more about Jesus
www.lds.org
..

"Gordon Burditt" wrote in message
...
The north-american power grid is large enough, and diverse enough, to be
about to (a) always have spare capacity somewhere on the grid, and (b)
be able to move that spare capacity around so it gets to those that need
it, when they need it.

Please explain the existence of "rolling blackouts", then. It happened
in Texas during both peak load times in the summer, and in the winter when
the excuse was that some of the plants on standby had some equipment freeze
or fail when they were needed.

Gordon Burditt wrote:

The north-american power grid is large enough, and diverse enough
to be about to (a) always have spare capacity somewhere on the
grid, and (b) be able to move that spare capacity around so it
gets to those that need it, when they need it.

Please explain the existence of "rolling blackouts", then.

You did not quote the following paragraph which was part of the same
post:

--------
Now, perhaps there have been issues with there not being enough wire (or
big-enough wire) to carry this demand, but that's a different story.
--------

It happened in Texas during both peak load times in the summer,
and in the winter

Texas is doing strange things when it comes to power.

There's a town in Texas that has a huge battery building (molten sodium
battery). The battery is charged during off-peak time, and then feeds
power into the town's grid during peak demand. The single power line
supplying power to the town is not large enough to supply the power the
town needs during peak demand, and instead of beefing up the line or
adding a second line, they built this battery at about half the cost.

Where else in the US besides Texas is having rolling blackouts during
the past year or two?

On 5/28/2012 8:55 AM, Home Guy wrote:
Gordon Burditt wrote:

The north-american power grid is large enough, and diverse enough
to be about to (a) always have spare capacity somewhere on the
grid, and (b) be able to move that spare capacity around so it
gets to those that need it, when they need it.

Please explain the existence of "rolling blackouts", then.

You did not quote the following paragraph which was part of the same
post:

--------
Now, perhaps there have been issues with there not being enough wire (or
big-enough wire) to carry this demand, but that's a different story.
--------

It happened in Texas during both peak load times in the summer,
and in the winter

Texas is doing strange things when it comes to power.

There's a town in Texas that has a huge battery building (molten sodium
battery). The battery is charged during off-peak time, and then feeds
power into the town's grid during peak demand. The single power line
supplying power to the town is not large enough to supply the power the
town needs during peak demand, and instead of beefing up the line or
adding a second line, they built this battery at about half the cost.

Where else in the US besides Texas is having rolling blackouts during
the past year or two?

CA? I believe I recall.

TX is also not very well connected to the rest of the US grid so if they
do have a problem they don't have much in the way of interconnects to
make up the difference.

There are always the occasional "gotcha's" -- during the cold streak
spoken of earlier, it was an unusual event and did cause some plants to
either go offline or not be available owing to freezing of lines that
simply weren't designed for the issue as it is such a rare event wasn't
accounted for as a design feature.

Also, sometimes a few plants will be off for either scheduled or
unscheduled outages and so not available and if the external event
happens during one of these times there just may not be enough standby.

One interesting event in TX panhandle about four(?) years ago had to do
w/ the new wind generation becoming a significant fraction of the
mix--the particular utility was taking about 20% from wind during a very
hot period when an unforecasted small wind shift line moved across the
area of the wind farm and winds went from 15-20mph to near zero in a
couple of minutes. The resulting drop in generation was so rapid it
nearly brought the entire region down before they could ramp up enough
generation and shed enough load. They managed to save it, but it was
close...I'll see if I can find the post-mortem report again--I posted it
once but it was shortly after so has been at least a couple of years
since...

--