To ask why the hell energy companies keep desperately trying to push SMART METERS?

[Peekaboo3]

Just that.

Why?

Hell will freeze over before I have them.

My energy provider has sent me a letter saying ...

'We are now ready to install your smart meters. Just one phone call, and we will install the meters at your convenience yada yada.'

With the way they've worded it, it sounds almost like you have no choice.

We do have a choice of course. And my choice is no.

It is NOT compulsory. So they can piss off bugging me.

But WHY do they keep pushing these bloody things?

WHY?

tianc Managing demand through price does NOT = cutting off supply to consumers when demand is high. Which was the context of the quote you took from my pp. In the context of my post I said nothing untrue.

The proposal is not to completely cut the power supply to the house to balance the grid. It's to cut power to individual appliances within the house to balance the grid.

This will be described in the PR as a "consumer choice" rather than an action of the utility company.

A major aim of the smart meter is to force the consumer to make such a choice – to actively choose whether or not to use power in the peak period, when currently this isn't something they have to think about. Smart-meter-enabled peak pricing is intended to create a demand side response by domestic customers.

Now I agree with you that there are going to be challenges with energy supply and security in the future (I say so in that thread).

I also say that it's important we have open and honest discussions about how we manage these challenges.

You may not have meant to say something false, but you did. It really doesn't further an open and honest discussion when you claim:
"Demand side response is a thing, but it is not really to do with domestic consumers; the idea is that if there are serious shortages in supply during times of peak demand (a serious future risk), participating businesses can reduce their usage."

We had one installed last year. The only benefit really was that the installer guy was incredibly hot and it was nice having him visit

Don't have one, wont be getting one. I have an online account with my energy suppliers and I read my own metres which takes 30 seconds and I send them the readings! not had anyone come out in years for readings. we don't know for a fact thst smart metres are accurate, I'm convinced they aren't. Friend had one fitted few months ago, lives in private rent, landlord said had to have it. Friend can be home all day with little one, boiling kettle, oven on, microwave, computer, music playing, and use less on such days according to metre than when she's been out at uni most of day. She's had them out and apparently its not defective!

Tianc, that quote was in response to a pp who claimed she had "been told" that the purpose of smart meters was to selectively cut off consumers in the event of electricity shortages. I pointed out that although cutting off certain consumers during electricity shortages was a thing, it was aimed at industrial users who had opted in to the scheme in return for financial incentives. I was not trying to mislead, and my statement was a lot less misleading than the pp I was replying to.

The ability to cut off certain appliances (say a freezer) during shortages would require the installation of more than just a smart meter.

I never claimed that domestic consumers adjusting their behaviour wasn't an aim of smart meters. Of course it is! (Not the only aim).

The idea that peaks in demand may be flattened by consumers CHOOSING to save money by adjusting their usage patterns is neither a secret, nor particularly sinister.
It wont be for everyone, and that fine. We all have different levels of price sensitivity. If I choose in the future to save money by using less at peak times and you don't, my choice to do so will not push the price of your electricity up. Quite the opposite.

An analogy: If I have no choice but to travel on public transport during peak times, whilst you are able to travel off-peak, your fares will be lower. But your choice will not make my fare more expensive - in fact it will push the cost of my peak-ticket down and make my journey less crowded.

More peak time capacity is needed as we rely more on alternative energy. But even more will be needed if nothing is done to flatten those peaks in demand. Building these (whether they are polluting generators or batteries) is expensive and will push the price of electricity up for everyone, unless they are subsidised in which case they will push up taxes.

So many comments about how useful smart meters are for monitoring your own usage, seeing which appliances are thirsty etc; Just keep your meters and get an OWL as a bolt on. They won’t fall silent when you switch suppliers and you can install them yourself really easily with a simple clip.

I've got a smart meter and it is useful to see exactly what you are using etc. I was hoping I wouldn't have to take readings but still getting estimated bills! Right pain but our mobile signal is very poor so the data on the meter can't be read by our electricity provider. Sort of defeats the object for them. With the poor mobile network in our country I guess lots of people are getting this problem. We should be investing in better communications, we are behind in this. Our broadband is crap too.

Peekaboo3

I am totally with you. My DM recently left a rather high up in the food chain job at one of the big six companies - she is dead against them too.

However, saying that pre-pay meters are cheaper wasn't my experience, when i moved in to my current house it had pre-pay meters. It cost me £22 a month more!

Taking my own readings is literally no faff whatsoever so will continue to do that and send it over online

"I never claimed that domestic consumers adjusting their behaviour wasn't an aim of smart meters. Of course it is!"

Thank you for finally coming out with this, after twice putting up straw men conflating "cutting off" with "reducing usage". (Though you still seem to be struggling with the difference.)

"The ability to cut off certain appliances (say a freezer) during shortages would require the installation of more than just a smart meter."

Yes. Which is why the plan is to install "smart" sockets or devices to talk by Wifi to the smart meter (which is where the Wifi security vulnerability comes in, for those who are interested).

What we need then is a way of storing energy during off peak times in the house and then using that stored energy in the house. Then the idea of peak pricing will fall apart if people can store energy in the house.

well, 30+ years on, we're still waiting. If we had this, maybe renewables would actually work.

This probably won't be true either:

If I choose in the future to save money by using less at peak times and you don't, my choice to do so will not push the price of your electricity up. Quite the opposite.

An analogy: If I have no choice but to travel on public transport during peak times, whilst you are able to travel off-peak, your fares will be lower. But your choice will not make my fare more expensive

What we've seen on the railways is that some fares are kept low by the regulator, which is nice if you can use those. The non-regulated fares have therefore soared. If you aren't able to fit your necessary travel to the regulated or discounted fares, you can end up paying phenomenal amounts.

Tianc I am not sure why you keep trying to claim I said something I never did. I replied to an incorrect statement about "cutting off consumers". I never at any point denied that domestic consumers may be encouraged to reduce usage at peak times. Why woudn't they be? Its a perfectly sensible thing to do!

You first conflated "cutting off" with "reduced usage" when you leapt on my post - not me. Read back over what I actually wrote and the context. I don't understand why you are so invested in believing that I was being deliberately misleading- you misunderstood me.

Others have already said on this thread that a "nudge" effect towards changing energy usage may be one of the benefits of smart grids. I agree with them.

As for railways: Choosing to travel at off-peak times does not make peak tickets more expensive.
Off-peak tickets are not to blame for outrageously high peak ticket prices.
There are issues with maximum ticket pricing, but making all ticket prices uniform regardless of the time of day would not make travel cheaper (it would make peak times even more crowded though.) What do you think would happen if they removed regulated fares and said that off-peak had to cost the same as peak? Do you really think they would bring the peak price down?

And you admitted yourself that the presence of a smart meter would not enable suppliers to randomly turn your fridge off; you would need additional technology fitted for this to be an option. Personally, I would be interested in participating in such a scheme if it becomes a reality in the future. I would be happy to switch my freezer off during times of v high demand if the financial incentives were high enough, and if I knew it would only be for a limited time. I completely appreciate not everyone would want to participate, and they wouldn't have to! In fact in this hypothetical scenario if everyone did the same, the individual savings to be had would be worse, so I'd rather they didn't!

Regardless of which mechanism is used to do the rationing – cost, per capita use, or a combination – the introduction of rationing in the evening cooking & housework period, or unpredictably according to the supply that minute, will create a massive change for consumers.

You can find the PDF of one of those DECC documents I was talking about if you google "Smarter Grids The Opportunity".

The below is from p17 (my bolding), though the whole document gives a good description of the planned radical changes, if you can see through the glossy, excited language. It's written largely from the point of view of the utility companies & DECC, rather than the consumer: washing machines may sound like non-urgent use to someone sitting in an office while a SAHP does their laundry; to a household of full-time working parents it may look rather different.

There's also a complete failure to acknowledge little details like the fact the DECC plan that washing machines and tumble driers go on in the night is precisely contrary to fire service recommendations, for example.

"Demand management
"As well as the possibility of better integration of electricity supply, smart grids could also deliver more precise management of demand.
Currently, the whole electricity system is designed to follow the peaks and troughs in demand...
. Demand management turns this approach on its head with the aim, where possible, of shaping demand to the available supply .
A smarter electricity system is integral to bringing in demand management on a large-scale. Smart meters in homes and businesses make it possible to offer consumers new incentives for shifting demand. It will be down to interaction between suppliers and consumers to determine exactly how this enabling technology is eventually used, but it offers the possibility of varying tariffs through the day, re ecting the amount of supply available. Some consumers are already on a set tariff that simply differentiates night-time from day-time use. With smart grids it will be possible for suppliers to set dynamic tariffs, reflecting the costs (and carbon content) of generation, transmission and distribution at any one time, or rewarding consumers for using more electricity at times when renewable sources are producing a lot of power output.
Lower prices at off-peak periods provide an incentive for switching some kinds of non-urgent electricity use – for example washing machines, driers, etc. – to these times, enabling consumers to save money on their bills. It may also become possible for consumers to opt for packages that allow appliances to be turned on and off automatically and remotely. With millions of homes on such a system, this approach would not only help smooth out troughs and peaks across the day, but also assist the grid operator in maintaining the second-by- second balance between supply and demand."

Tianc The bigger the differences between peak and low demand, and the more intermittent the regular supply, the more back up will be needed to balance the grid. This could be storage or it could be generators, but it will cost money.
Where is the money going to come from? Whether its subsidised by taxes, or passed on in full to the energy consumer we will be the ones paying for it.

An efficient way of smoothing out the peaks will save consumers money not cost more.

I got a smart meter in from scottish power on 17th november... im still waiting on my gas meter being commisoned to it and we are now in march. The service has been utterly appaling

"washing machines may sound like non-urgent use to someone sitting in an office while a SAHP does their laundry; to a household of full-time working parents it may look rather different."

Yeah, which is why NO-ONE IS BEING FORCED to switch off their washing machine in the evening.

If it costs more to wash clothes in the evening, some people will wash their clothes in the day instead (the SAHM in your example maybe). Other people will decide the extra cost is worth it to wash their clothes at a time convenient to them (the full time worker perhaps).
This is not a radical, sinister idea!

I might opt in and save money, my neighbour may not and will pay higher prices than me (but still lower than if the peaks had not been reduced). My choice and their choice. We have different price sensitivities.
I shop at Lidl, they use the local Waitrose for convenience.
I don't think that removing the option of Lidl from me is going to make either myself or my neighbour better off.

Well, squishy, readers will have to decide for themselves whether they found your statement misleading.

Fortunately the thread has moved on and now explains fairly well how one of the purposes of smart meters is to balance the grid by managing the demand side of domestic use rather than just by managing the supply side. Ie by reducing consumers' usage in "peak periods" as designated by the utilities companies, and under current plans by using pricing as the mechanism for this.

Which is the fundamental point everyone needs to understand in order to have that honest and open debate.

Installing (and now replacing because the first lot are out of date) smart meters is costing millions. In fact IIRC, billions. It's all being passed on to the consumer.

So, we both agree that:

a)DSR is NOT concerned with cutting off domestic consumers supply completely.
b)Industrial consumers can opt in to schemes where there supply is cut off/reduced at times of shortages in return for financial incentives
c)domestic consumers may have financial incentives to shift some of their usage away from times of peak demand.

I think you thought I was denying c) earlier when I was in fact asserting a).
I don't consider c) to be particularly sinister and it seems like a sensible way of balancing the grid and avoiding blackouts and brownouts.
You are suspicious of c - and cynicism is fine imo but I don't like to see panic spreading misleading claims made.

My own feeling is that, although it's not quite there yet, improved storage (either supplier side or domestically in the form of electric-car batteries) is going to prove the simplest, most cost-effective means of balancing the grid, and can probably be done without the massive security vulnerability that smart meters will introduce.

But I haven't actually researched the details, so that's just off the top of my head.

We had one. It was quite interesting to see how much power different things were using. For about 3 days.

Then the thing started beeping and wouldn't stop no matter what we tried, so we threw it in the garage under the tent (large muffly thing!). It managed to still send our meter readings in, so that part was impressive.

Then we switched providers after a year and that was that. Although the smart meter is probably still under the tent, haven't been camping for a while.

Battery technology has improved a lot over the last few years, and agree it has a role to play. I think that domestic storage would still need smart technology to be most effective- if (hypothetically) my car was also a battery, not only would some kind of programming be necessary to draw power from my car at 7pm and charge it up at 2am (but not when I wanted to go out at 8pm), but there would need to be some kind of financial incentive for me to do this. It would have to be more expensive for me to charge my car at peak demand for me to voluntarily avoid this.
There are security concerns with smart meters, but I don't think its inevitable for them to be vulnerable; if done well and properly regulated the risks can be reduced to an acceptable level. I don't see why they should be any easier to hack remotely than a phone (which would give a lot more info about our movements than a smart meter).

Increased interconnectivity with other countries could also be potentially very helpful in smoothing out demand, but unfortunately this I can see this kind of cooperation becoming harder politically in the future. Apparently we don't want to co-operate with other countries, even when its mutually beneficial.

You don't need to have a smart meter to monitor your usage, you can simply get a monitor. Utility companies were giving them away a few years ago.

And unless your meter is in place where it's difficult to read it, you don't need to have estimated bills.

Scottish Power keep leaving messages on the answerphone about having a smart meter fitted. We're ignoring them. We also occasionally had letters from Siemens, going back a few years, saying they wanted to fit a smart meter. We ignored those too.

OP, your anecdote about friends who used prepayment meters, is just that, an anecdote. They probably limited their use of energy so they didn't run out, as the tariffs are well known to be more for prepayment than DD. This is why the government have had to step in to get the companies to reduce the rates, as it tends to be poorer people who use them (or tenants whose landlords have it written in the contract they they're not allowed to change to normal meters, which is an unenforcable/possibly illegal, term).

Won't be getting one. No problem for me to read meters once a month, and I don't care what energy I'm using at anyone point (can install my own usage meter if I wanted to anyways), if I need to do something using gas or electric I'll do it, I'm not gonna sit in a freezing house to save a few pence, I'll put the heating on when I feel the need.

The more people get them, the quicker surge pricing of your utilities will become commonplace.

I'm not suggesting using car batteries as temporary storage, but that the electric car population plugged in at any one time may become one of several useful reservoirs into which to usefully "dump" temporary oversupply, depending on the robustness of the batteries.

I'm not up-to-date, but there was talk of separate rates and metering for them anyway, which would facilitate this.