Smart meters - yay or nay ?

Forums › Gadgets, robotics, home automation, electronics (including wearables) › Smart meters - yay or nay ?

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#2386766 7-Jan-2020 15:16

evilengineer:

Totally agree. Smart Meters in NZ are half-arsed at best.

In the UK (and I think it's legally mandated, although I could be wrong) the smart meter comes with a little wireless display that gives real time consumption information so you can literally walk around the house flipping switches and see what happens.

That plus an API so you could set up Home Assistant or whatever to automatically kill the Spa Pool/hot water tank/freezer for a couple of hours when the price spikes would be pretty cool.

The only real advantage is the end of those bill shock horror stories you used to hear when the power company had someone on "estimated readings" for months on end.

The bigger smart meters (provided by the likes of Genesis) do have the functionality of reviewing data in real time (and have more smarts) - you might be able to set something up with HA if you have a retailer that charges when the price spikes by plugging in some other library for that? Never used such a retailer myself but I'm assuming ones that charge this way have a way of letting consumers know?

migrif

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#2386768 7-Jan-2020 15:20

My Smart Meter is inside, so I've attached an Wemos D1 Mini, with a pulse counter blue tacked onto the flashing LED. This feeds into Home Assistant. So every minute I get updated power usage.

https://www.esphome.io/cookbook/power_meter.html

PolicyGuy

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#2386769 7-Jan-2020 15:21

evilengineer:

The only real advantage is the end of those bill shock horror stories you used to hear when the power company had someone on "estimated readings" for months on end.

Sometimes that's on purpose.

When we couldn't get access to a meter, and the customer wasn't responding to notices, and we didn't have a (valid) phone number for the customer, the Billing Supervisor (RIP David) would say "Dammit, this'll get their attention, I'll estimate them for a million units".
It worked
LOL

PolicyGuy

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#2386770 7-Jan-2020 15:22

snnet:

evilengineer:

Totally agree. Smart Meters in NZ are half-arsed at best.

In the UK (and I think it's legally mandated, although I could be wrong) the smart meter comes with a little wireless display that gives real time consumption information so you can literally walk around the house flipping switches and see what happens.

That plus an API so you could set up Home Assistant or whatever to automatically kill the Spa Pool/hot water tank/freezer for a couple of hours when the price spikes would be pretty cool.

The only real advantage is the end of those bill shock horror stories you used to hear when the power company had someone on "estimated readings" for months on end.

The bigger smart meters (provided by the likes of Genesis) do have the functionality of reviewing data in real time (and have more smarts) - you might be able to set something up with HA if you have a retailer that charges when the price spikes by plugging in some other library for that? Never used such a retailer myself but I'm assuming ones that charge this way have a way of letting consumers know?

Another thing to remember is that at least some retailers who install "smart" meters won't allow other retailers access to the half-hour consumption data if the customer uses a different retailer.

I know this is true because the house I moved into a year ago has a TrustPower "smart" meter, but Genesis have to send a meter reader round every two months.
I understand (but not from personal experience) that Genesis won't share data from their meters with other retailers.

This means that

The retailer who owns the meter probably still has access to the half-hour data for a premises for which they are no longer the retailer;
The customer does not have access to their own consumption data; and
The customer cannot change to a retail offering that depends on the availability of half-hour data

Maybe I ought to discuss this with the Commerce Commission

Edit: add actual content :(

mattwnz

20181 posts

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#2386816 7-Jan-2020 15:30

evilengineer:

In the UK (and I think it's legally mandated, although I could be wrong) the smart meter comes with a little wireless display that gives real time consumption information so you can literally walk around the house flipping switches and see what happens.

That plus an API so you could set up Home Assistant or whatever to automatically kill the Spa Pool/hot water tank/freezer for a couple of hours when the price spikes would be pretty cool.

The only real advantage is the end of those bill shock horror stories you used to hear when the power company had someone on "estimated readings" for months on end.

I just can't understand why we don't have those in NZ. Normally NZ is ahead of the UK when it comes to this sort of thing. Even the apps that companies like Electric kiwi provide, are delayed by a day.

Geektastic

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#2386817 7-Jan-2020 15:32

You should be thinking “I have no choice so may as well worry about something else”!

mattwnz

20181 posts

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#2386820 7-Jan-2020 15:33

snnet:

evilengineer:

Totally agree. Smart Meters in NZ are half-arsed at best.

In the UK (and I think it's legally mandated, although I could be wrong) the smart meter comes with a little wireless display that gives real time consumption information so you can literally walk around the house flipping switches and see what happens.

That plus an API so you could set up Home Assistant or whatever to automatically kill the Spa Pool/hot water tank/freezer for a couple of hours when the price spikes would be pretty cool.

The only real advantage is the end of those bill shock horror stories you used to hear when the power company had someone on "estimated readings" for months on end.

The bigger smart meters (provided by the likes of Genesis) do have the functionality of reviewing data in real time (and have more smarts) - you might be able to set something up with HA if you have a retailer that charges when the price spikes by plugging in some other library for that? Never used such a retailer myself but I'm assuming ones that charge this way have a way of letting consumers know?

I think they are on the smart meter itself, so you have to go out to the meter box to see it. Plus it is still not providing all that information. This is teh type of thing consuemrs get in teh UK, and you can see exactly what you are paying in relation to the usage

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=abb_hW0Yag8&t=9s

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rb99

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#2386843 7-Jan-2020 15:48

I assumed they'd be saving money on meter readers, and assumed they wouldn't pass any savings on, not that they'd be much.

Would be nice if they could be more informative, but our bills aren't too bad and hopefully there won't be any weird stuff with old sticky meters as I think ours is only about 10 years old anyway.

Still, I suppose in a few years proper smart meters will be mandated and they can all be replaced again (at our expense).

“The modern conservative is engaged in one of man's oldest exercises in moral philosophy; that is, the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness.” -John Kenneth Galbraith

rb99

evilengineer

466 posts

Ultimate Geek

#2386845 7-Jan-2020 15:51

PolicyGuy:

evilengineer:

The only real advantage is the end of those bill shock horror stories you used to hear when the power company had someone on "estimated readings" for months on end.

Sometimes that's on purpose.

When we couldn't get access to a meter, and the customer wasn't responding to notices, and we didn't have a (valid) phone number for the customer, the Billing Supervisor (RIP David) would say "Dammit, this'll get their attention, I'll estimate them for a million units".
It worked
LOL

The ones that hit the newspapers tended to be the other way round.

Eighteen months of $25 power bills. "This is awesome" followed by abject horror when the five grand catch-up bill arrives!

davidcole

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#2386846 7-Jan-2020 15:53

I remember asking the electricity authority about the data, and the use of it (and regulations). They were basically hands off.

Thank you for your email and query around smart meters and live usage of electricity.

We don’t regulate how the data is sent (in terms of when and how much). What typically happens is the meter records a reading every half hour, then that data is collectively sent once a day, usually in the early morning. It’s just like sending a text message.

The retailer can arrange to query the meter if needed outside of the programmed timing, but they are unlikely to do so unless there is a problem (they are charged by telecommunications companies to send the data).

Hope this helps, best wishes for a good weekend.

So until one of the governments want to force the companies to open up....or we start putting our own readers on them, there's not a lot we'll get out of it.

I pull my Genesis data every day for the past 2 days, and but storing it at home can overlay current stuff with it, ie alarm information from 48 hours ago coupled with the power reading back then to see what was happening.

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evilengineer

466 posts

Ultimate Geek

#2386849 7-Jan-2020 16:02

mattwnz:

I just can't understand why we don't have those in NZ. Normally NZ is ahead of the UK when it comes to this sort of thing. Even the apps that companies like Electric kiwi provide, are delayed by a day.

You can blame blame Gerry Brownlee, apparently:

https://www.consumer.org.nz/articles/smart-meters

Scroll down to, "An opportunity squandered?".

wellygary

8345 posts

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#2386865 7-Jan-2020 16:33

evilengineer:

mattwnz:

I just can't understand why we don't have those in NZ. Normally NZ is ahead of the UK when it comes to this sort of thing. Even the apps that companies like Electric kiwi provide, are delayed by a day.

You can blame blame Gerry Brownlee, apparently:

https://www.consumer.org.nz/articles/smart-meters

Scroll down to, "An opportunity squandered?".

But to be Honest, most NZers don't care,

and until major retailers offer products that actually incentivise consumers to shift load off peak, there will be no incentive for customers to take any notice of what their usage is on an hourly basis...

richms

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#2386872 7-Jan-2020 16:57

Until we all move to a real time pricing model then its irrelevant about what you are using when unless you are tracking down loads that you don't expect.

Im still really annoyed that we have no smart water meters that would allow for leaks to be detected a lot earlier. At least Auckland gets readings every second month now, but it used to be much worse. If they want me to pay monthly they should at least read it monthly for that.

Richard rich.ms

wired

187 posts

Master Geek

#2386879 7-Jan-2020 17:15

It could be option d) ‘they will turn up and find out that they can’t replace it’.

my meter board is too close to the gas meter (inside the gas exclusion zone) so replacing the meter is considered a modification to the meter board which they can’t do because it was inside the zone. So they left me with my old mechanical meter.

They still need to send someone round to read the gas meter so they read the electricity meter at the same time.

mattwnz

20181 posts

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#2386883 7-Jan-2020 17:20

wellygary:

evilengineer:

mattwnz:

I just can't understand why we don't have those in NZ. Normally NZ is ahead of the UK when it comes to this sort of thing. Even the apps that companies like Electric kiwi provide, are delayed by a day.

You can blame blame Gerry Brownlee, apparently:

https://www.consumer.org.nz/articles/smart-meters

Scroll down to, "An opportunity squandered?".

But to be Honest, most NZers don't care,

and until major retailers offer products that actually incentivise consumers to shift load off peak, there will be no incentive for customers to take any notice of what their usage is on an hourly basis...

I think change will need to come to cope with the huge population increase and the influx of EVs that will all need charging that will place a huge load onto the power grid. I do worry that we won't have the capacity, and these days it is probably very difficult o build a new hydro generation due to all the red tape.

I think if many people had a digital display showing hope much money was dripping out of their bank account in real time, people will try to reduce it as much as they can.

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