Got "smartmetered" today at the CA house.

[Ungrounded Lightning Rod]

PGE's contractor came by the California place and installed the new "smartmeters" - adapter on the gas meter and a new (GE) electric meter.  Installer said they were also installing a radio network later and there would be no more meter readers wandering the streets.  Also claimed the meters couldn't shut the power off...

Called and asked if the E-meter did net metering of if we'd need to change it out later if/when I add RE.  They said it did not and they'd have to replace it with a bidirectional meter when we go with RE.  (They kept saying "solar" - probably because they're not familiar with home wind turbines and used to dealing with the commercial solar panel systems that are all the rage here.)

So looked up the meter on GE's web site:

 - It DOES do remote shutdown "to solve problems with people who don't pay their bill" B-)

 - Communication on this model is two-way, using Internet Protocol and crypto.  They can upgrade the firmware remotely.

 - It has a feature to "detect cheating", i.e. when people pull the meter and flip it upside-down for a few days to run it backward.  It also records the surrounding events (unplug, replug) for later evidence.  (No doubt this would be triggered if I backfed the line.)

Looks like "stealth net-metering", even for a temporary test, is right out.  B-)  (Not that I'd have done that rather than doing it the official way.)  Hooking up even a small system on the sly would look like a cheat if it ever got ahead of the house load.  (I wonder what they do for electrically-braked elevators...)

And the whole thing looks like a GREAT opportunity for some cracker to get into their net and sabotage individual sites or the whole thing.  B-(

[Dave B]

 See through the "grid tie" scams and the smart meter "smart grid" is being pushed as the greatest thing and better for the world. Just more government playing on the given fact that most people still want to do the right thing so most buy into that story.

 You don't suppose the government wants a little more control over the general public do you ? Nah, can't be, I must be paranoid. This stuff is getting old and people are getting wise.

 My last electric bill was 75% delivery, connection fees, taxes of any kind you can think of and only 25% electric usage. It's a race, the grid is losing so they continue to jack up the delivery charges and make a tremendous pitch for "grid tie". Talk about a win, win for the grid, and they'll still have their hooks in you to boot. Cut the cord as soon as you can, I'm working hard towards it.  Dave B.

[dnix71]

Maybe some haxors could do a firmware "upgrade" and take control of the grid. Like the Outer Limits

There is nothing wrong with your electricity. Do not attempt to adjust the meter. We are controlling transmission. If we wish to make it louder, we will bring up the voltage. If we wish to make it softer, we will tune it to a brownout. We will control the horizontal. We will control the vertical. We control the frequency and can make it flutter. We can change the focus to a soft blur or sharpen it to crystal clarity. For the next hour, sit quietly and we will control your grid.

We repeat: there is nothing wrong with your electricity. You are about to participate in a great adventure. You are about to experience the awe and mystery which reaches from the inner mind to... The Outer Limits.

[dnix71]

[DamonHD]

Oh, we've had all our meters swapped in the last year or so, in some cases more than once, and still all dumber even than me.

We went from a gas meter in cuft to one in m^3, and a single unratcheted ancient electric meter to a digital generation meter, an import meter and an export meter!

Rgds

Damon

[framistan]

Be carefull of "cutting your grid-tie"  Because if you volunteer to cut off your electric/gas service, then the utility company might retaliate against you by continuing to bill you for the monthly "connection/delivery/taxes" fees.  They JUSTIFY this by saying you live in a community that pays for community electric (or gas)wires/poles/pipes/etc..services. so by living in that community, you are subject to the fees even if you get OFF their grid and supply your own electricity via wind or solar. To bypass this trap, it might be wiser to pay late or not at all for their electricity, and let THEM disconnect YOU.  If you are honest with them, and cut the grid, you might be billed monthly ANYWAY.  Does anyone else have any opinions/knowledge about this?? please post what you know. I do not have personal experience of this.... but this is just from things i have heard locally and seen on tv years ago...

[Hilltopgrange]

Hi I am located in Northern Ireland U.K. luckily our supplier has no standing charge or line rental /service charge etc you just pay for what you use.  

I use very little from the grid just 5 kwh in the past 6 months at just over 0.09p per kwh total of under 0.50p(about 20c US), that was used by my welder everything else runs from the wind turbines.

I get regular SURPRISE visits from the supplier (NIE)to check my meter to make sure I haven't bypassed it ! Although they wont tell you that. The last visit was a few weeks ago their excuse was that they where checking for a fault in the area. They simply remove the main fuse and checked for load on a meter . I normally just show them where the meter is and leave them to it however this time after they left I had a look at the meter myself  and noticed they hadn't replaced the anti tamper seal on the main fuse so I had to get them back out to refit it. So if you do get a visit it is worth checking the seals! If I hadn't  they would no doubt have tried to accuse me of theft on their next surprise visit! You would think they would notice 3 wind turbines flying and take note. In future I will stay with them while they run the tests!

If they decide in the future to charge for the line or service I will be telling them to remove it and their poles from my property or I will charge them ground rent!

Just a heads up on what happens when you don't use enough!

Russell

[SparWeb]

I got one of those installed in March.  I phoned the utility company and boy it sure took a while to convince them I was not "complaining" about it.  I was just genuinely curious.

Since everyone in the area got the change-over in the same day, the all read "0" on the same day.  Now I can go to all the neighbours and see who's using the most electricity.

Not that I would do such a nosy thing.

Not me.

Anyway if you're into cheating, you could try a "tinfoil hat" so the meter's telemetry signal can't be broadcast.  I guess big brother would eventually notice that, too.

[Nothing40]

Last time I was reading about the new meters,it said that the data was sent back over the grid itself,with something like a 300khz(not sure of exact freq.) carrier. So a tinfoil hat wouldn't do much good on those.

[DamonHD]

There are (a) systems which are two-way and those that aren't and (b) those that are two way have multiple possible routes for the data upstream.

On (a) one entirely viable flavour of smart-metering IMHO is where tariffs and warnings etc are sent down to the meter in real time but no data is stored other than usage at each tariff, and that data is collected by someone with (say) a wireless handset outside the premises, not live. Smart metering does not always involve the ability for utilities to tell burglars when to break in because you are away on holiday. B^>

On (b) one viable back-channel is using an always-on Internet connection that the user already has: indeed I submitted a proposal myself recently to a UK electricity supplier on that basis and spoke as an 'expert' (goodness, what went wrong there!) at a CIBSE panel discussion.  The Internet-as-backchannel mechanism has the advantage of not requiring everyone else in the pipeline to agree on infrastructure and also that with care it costs the end user nothing (eg on a flat-rate Internet connection).  In the UK the retail supplier is often neither the "DNO" that runs the last mile of copper to your door nor the generator of the energy that you consume, and National Grid that runs the big bit of iron in the middle is also separate: lots of reasons not to get data-transmission infrastructure in place quickly...

Rgds

Damon