Smart gas meters on their way.

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#3044233 3-Mar-2023 11:29

davidcole:

Pity we couldn't get a higher resolution. Cross your fingers that it wakes up hourly for a reading and only transmits once a day. But I would expect 1 reading once a day.

I have hourly data available through the Genesis website, same as electricity

mkissin

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#3044234 3-Mar-2023 11:32

I had mine upgraded through Genesis a couple months ago.

The new meter gives me hourly usage readings.

The install process was super easy. I didn't need to be home except for the relight process, for which the installer phoned me and set a time which was convenient for me within the window of 4pm - 8pm. They did need to come inside though; the whole point is that they check the appliances.

Mehrts

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#3044237 3-Mar-2023 11:44

scuwp:

This isn't new. Had ours done probably 3+ months ago.

That's still relatively new 🤷‍♂️

fearandloathing

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#3044292 3-Mar-2023 12:12

Mehrts:
scuwp:

This isn't new. Had ours done probably 3+ months ago.

That's still relatively new 🤷‍♂️

New to me too!

davidcole

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#3044298 3-Mar-2023 12:51

scuwp:

This isn't new. Had ours done probably 3+ months ago.

So new for me I don't even have one yet...

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Behodar

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#3044315 3-Mar-2023 13:47

davidcole:

Battery operated.....ok. Must have a pretty low amount of transmission time. And then just sleep all the time. Surely you wont get hourly figures out of it like we do electricity?

Just a pity that whoever receives the data (for electricity meter and I assume gas), doesn't seem to release it to all consumers till after 48 hours (genesis has this delay)....and that they have no programmatic way of accessing it. I don't want to manually pull it down so I can overlay other metrics I have here.

Ask a company like this for api access and they go "whats that". They broke the srapey/api access I'd had previous when they changed to an oauth authentication.

I got an email from Vector the other day saying they're going to upgrade the modem in my electricity meter. There's a link to FAQs, along with a "technical information" section. This "technical" section contains questions like "what is a modem?" and says nothing about what they're actually doing (presumably moving to LTE or similar) and certainly doesn't mention APIs!

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davidcole

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#3044319 3-Mar-2023 13:50

Behodar:

davidcole:

Battery operated.....ok. Must have a pretty low amount of transmission time. And then just sleep all the time. Surely you wont get hourly figures out of it like we do electricity?

Just a pity that whoever receives the data (for electricity meter and I assume gas), doesn't seem to release it to all consumers till after 48 hours (genesis has this delay)....and that they have no programmatic way of accessing it. I don't want to manually pull it down so I can overlay other metrics I have here.

Ask a company like this for api access and they go "whats that". They broke the srapey/api access I'd had previous when they changed to an oauth authentication.

I got an email from Vector the other day saying they're going to upgrade the modem in my electricity meter. There's a link to FAQs, along with a "technical information" section. This "technical" section contains questions like "what is a modem?" and says nothing about what they're actually doing (presumably moving to LTE or similar) and certainly doesn't mention APIs!

No you wont get an api from vector. Up to your provider reatailer. I think only flick and some of those smaller modern companies give you api access to that data. Genesis, spark, 2deg wont touch that with a barge pole.

scuwp

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#3044325 3-Mar-2023 14:21

turtleattacks:

scuwp:

This isn't new. Had ours done probably 3+ months ago.

Quick and painless. They just get you to check that the gas is working before they leave.

So they can stay in the garden while we check our gas hood/hot water is working?

Yes, didn't come inside at all. Took 30 seconds.

Lazy is such an ugly word, I prefer to call it selective participation

PolicyGuy

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#3044326 3-Mar-2023 14:21

davidcole:

No you wont get an api from vector. Up to your provider reatailer. I think only flick and some of those smaller modern companies give you api access to that data. Genesis, spark, 2deg wont touch that with a barge pole.

You misunderstand the purposes of "smart" meters in NZ.

Their purposes are: firstly and most importantly to save the retailer the cost of hiring meter readers; and secondarily to provide a more convenient platform to support a time-of-use tariff structure that would enable the retailer to more profitably leverage their generation infrastructure.

Notice what's missing here? Yes, it's you, the customer. The installation of "smart" meters in NZ has nothing to do with customer benefits, they are a profit maximisation device. That is all.
😡😡😡

ajw

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#3044347 3-Mar-2023 16:10

Behodar:

davidcole:

Battery operated.....ok. Must have a pretty low amount of transmission time. And then just sleep all the time. Surely you wont get hourly figures out of it like we do electricity?

Just a pity that whoever receives the data (for electricity meter and I assume gas), doesn't seem to release it to all consumers till after 48 hours (genesis has this delay)....and that they have no programmatic way of accessing it. I don't want to manually pull it down so I can overlay other metrics I have here.

Ask a company like this for api access and they go "whats that". They broke the srapey/api access I'd had previous when they changed to an oauth authentication.

I got an email from Vector the other day saying they're going to upgrade the modem in my electricity meter. There's a link to FAQs, along with a "technical information" section. This "technical" section contains questions like "what is a modem?" and says nothing about what they're actually doing (presumably moving to LTE or similar) and certainly doesn't mention APIs!

In my case they switched the meter to Spark 4G from Vodafone.

wellygary

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#3044350 3-Mar-2023 16:25

PolicyGuy:

You misunderstand the purposes of "smart" meters in NZ.

Their purposes are: firstly and most importantly to save the retailer the cost of hiring meter readers; and secondarily to provide a more convenient platform to support a time-of-use tariff structure that would enable the retailer to more profitably leverage their generation infrastructure.

"smart" power meters also allow remote disconnection and reconnections, removing another need for technical staff to travel to sites..

It would be interesting to know if the Gas meters are "one directional" and only send data, or whether they can be commanded remotely to terminate services....

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stick

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#3044352 3-Mar-2023 16:51

PolicyGuy:
Notice what's missing here? Yes, it's you, the customer. The installation of "smart" meters in NZ has nothing to do with customer benefits, they are a profit maximisation device. That is all.
😡😡😡

Did you not read the link the OP added in their initial post?
"Because your meter will be read remotely, there’s no need to worry about people coming onto your property, leaving a key with the meter reader or having to keep pets inside."

I have a relative who's in this situation. His gas meter was in the garage so a smart meter would help in his case

PolicyGuy

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#3044384 3-Mar-2023 17:23

St1ick:
PolicyGuy:

Notice what's missing here? Yes, it's you, the customer. The installation of "smart" meters in NZ has nothing to do with customer benefits, they are a profit maximisation device. That is all.
😡😡😡

Did you not read the link the OP added in their initial post?
"Because your meter will be read remotely, there’s no need to worry about people coming onto your property, leaving a key with the meter reader or having to keep pets inside."

I have a relative who's in this situation. His gas meter was in the garage so a smart meter would help in his case

Occasionally, there will be advantages to a customer, such as in that case.
Minor customer benefits are incidental outcomes to the corporate cost reduction strategy.

SomeoneSomewhere

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#3044399 3-Mar-2023 18:46

Most electrical smart meters and I imagine these gas meters cannot disconnect power. Disconnection requires high-current relays (or a valve), which bump up costs significantly and make the safety and reliability tests a fair bit more difficult.

Many microcontrollers used for metering purposes have accumulators/counters that can continue to count even while the MCU is in deep sleep. Alternatively, waking for a fraction of a millisecond on each rising edge of each pulse is also a possibility. Starting a radio and transmitting data is a *much* more energy intensive operation.

It's likely that the MCU can't actually read the current value on the meter, only count the pulse-per-revolution.

dolsen

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#3044401 3-Mar-2023 19:03

SomeoneSomewhere:

Many microcontrollers used for metering purposes have accumulators/counters that can continue to count even while the MCU is in deep sleep. Alternatively, waking for a fraction of a millisecond on each rising edge of each pulse is also a possibility. Starting a radio and transmitting data is a *much* more energy intensive operation.

It's likely that the MCU can't actually read the current value on the meter, only count the pulse-per-revolution.

That's what I originally thought, an interrupt as the counter rolls over, accumulated pulses and time between to find flow rate etc - which is how my current home setup works using the existing meter and a reed switch. Looking at some of the documentation on Nova website though, the meter looks like this.

https://www.edmi-meters.com/australasia/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/GR-8BU-Factsheet-English.pdf

Based on that, the meter does / will allow for remote disconnection and doesn't have the mechanical meter of the old style.

https://www.powerco.co.nz/what-we-do/our-projects/gas-smart-meter-rollout

https://www.novaenergy.co.nz/news/smart-gas-meter-trial

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