Tuesday, 06 January 2009 01:37

What is all this SmartMeter, Mumbo Jumbo?

2009 is proving to be the year of the smart meter, yet we are only on day 5.  Getting back to the office this morning to be met with an abundance of emails and voicemails from business and consumers wanting more information on SmartMeters.

The global financial crisis has further sparked consumers to be more energy conscious whereas before the ability to know what you’re spending on energy at any given time involves some serious spreadsheet calculations even then it is always retroactive.

Having tried these clip-on meters, while they do make calculations easier and do let you know the Kilowatts per hour being used, I can’t seem to balance the books when comparing to my energy bill.  At best Clip-on Meters to be totally effective are gadgets left for the diehard enthusiasts.  That being said, these devices have a hidden advantage which none seem to promote, if you are like me and constantly checking how much energy you are using during different stages throughout the day, you become conversant to the normal KW/H usage amounts; as I have my SmartMeter display located by my front door I check it before I leave the house; religiously.  By doing so, I know what energy is being consumed and if it is higher than normal, then I have accidently left something on that I shouldn’t have; yes I have at times left on the iron and even the cooker.  By simply having this device it has potentially saved me my home and of course the wasted energy.

Which nicely brings me on to my all time favourite energy saver; which has to be the ByeByeStandby solution from Domia, this is a true consumer energy saving device.  Plug and Play, it could not be simpler to install.  According to the ByeByeStandby website it claims to be able to save a household on average £38 a year which may not seem much compared to the initial outlay cost of the equipment which we have spent in the region of £380 due to all the add-ons required for the abundant gadgetry that plagues my home. Just before the New Year I calculated the actual financial energy savings to be just over £320, which amounts to 20% of my annual energy consumption.  These simple devices plug into all your “Vampire” electrical devices, which include equipment such as TVs, DVD Players, Satellite and Cable boxes, microwaves and even your broadband router.  With a simple click of a button before bedtime or before leaving your home; all these devices are powered off in one go; no more running around checking the plug sockets and thinking you left something on.

I would however want to improve on these devices by making them a direct replacement for the wall sockets themselves; this of course would remove those sometimes awkward and unsightly plug-in modules.  I would also want the ability to have a coded frequency so as I am not turning off my neighbour’s equipment and vice versa.

So what is all this talk about SmartGrids and SmartMeters, what does it mean to me the consumer and how am I going to benefit from it?

If we talk about smart meters from an electricity provider point of view, what it means for the consumer is you will have a little display box where you can put anywhere in your home; which will then allow you to see visually how much electricity you are using, how much it is currently costing, it should even tell you how much CO2 you are dumping into the atmosphere.  In most cases you will know exactly what your electric bill is for any given month, week, day down to the second and also have the ability to compare the costs to previous dates.  Being equipped with this information will better equip you to effectively control what energy you consume and how you apply it, the power companies will be able to allow incentives if you were to lower your usage at peak times or overall.

Current dumb meters simply record the units used, it is then up to the energy supplier to take readings or in most cases estimate what your usages is, and we all know how great they are at doing that!

Furthermore most standard electric meters are one way, meaning that it only accepts electricity going into the meter from the power grid.  Smart Meters on the other hand should have the ability to take energy generated from your own property, be it from the likes of Solar Panels or Wind Turbines and sell back the unused energy direct to your neighbourhood.  The issue with having your own solar or wind generated equipment is not just the initial costs; it’s the storing of the energy.  This is currently done via big batteries, but wouldn’t it be great when you pop off to the Costa Brava for a few weeks on vacation your home is quietly making you money with all the energy it is producing and not being used.

Currently in the UK and abroad there are trials of these new smart meters, using electric meters with built-in mobile phones or a landline telephone that send messages back to the Energy Company with a meter reading; while this is ok for trial purposes it really has no future in a nationwide rollout.  In order for these meters to be effective what is required is a SmartGrid.  A SmartGrid can be considered as closed internet of Energy Companies, Substations and such; going right back to your meter.  Much like how the internet works today whereas your computer acts as a node to an interconnected community.  The SmartGrid will allow for high-speed digital communications between your home and the electric grid, enabling real time monitoring of energy usage and billing.  It will also pave the way for smarter cleaner energy as it will all but eliminate wastage and as a result reduce carbon emission.

The development and rollout of SmartGrid technologies will have the added bonus of creating millions of new green-collar energy jobs related to the renewable energy industry, manufacturing, plug-in electric vehicles, solar panel and wind turbine generation and energy conservation construction; which in the current economic climate is desperately needed.

The IT industry is also going to see a much needed boost as it is likely in most development countries a new Central Communications Agency will be created to process and store all the information sent from your smart meter, which will take away the current processing away from the Energy Companies.  This very reason is in part causing a delay in the Roll out of SmartMeters in the UK as Energy Companies want to control this information.  Although that is very unlikely as this will restrict competition and would not benefit the consumer.

Around 46 Million Gas and Electric Smart Meters as to be installed in the UK starting in 2010 with tenders going out later this year.  Companies such as BT, O2, and Vodafone along with systems developers Accenture, Logica, IBM, and Capgemini have all expressed an interest to get in on this mass installation which will of course create significant employment opportunities within these organisations.

I hear you sigh at some of those well known names; however all is not lost as it is also possible that the contract may be broken down regionally, which will allow for local firms to get in on this action.  This is an approximate £7bn project and is estimated to take around 12 years to complete, so now is the time for training.  UK Companies to watch in 2009 are Horstmann, PRI, Echelon and Itron.  Let’s not forget Accenture; all great companies with impressive futures.