"Smart meters"

[gar]

120329-1003 EDT

In your area how do so called "smart meters" work? Questions like:
1. What is measured?
Current separately in each leg or the sum of the two legs, power of each leg or just the sum, voltage on each leg or the sum, short time peak power, power factor, etc.
What is the sampling rate, whose chip, short time averaging time, longer time averaging time, how long is data stored in meter, etc.
2. How often is data communicated to power company?
Is it on command, or just randomly sent. If randomly sent and collisions occur how does the meter know to resend?
3. Can the meter be disabled remotely? Meaning is there an internal contactor.
4. What is peak power during transmission, carrier frequency, and data transmission duration?
5. Is there public resistance to installing these meters?

References:
http://www.michigan.gov/mpsc/0,4639,7-159-16400_17280-269136--,00.html

An illustration of some of the nonsense from customers
http://efile.mpsc.state.mi.us/efile/docs/17000/0102.pdf

Following is a copy of DTE's filing with the MPSC. It is long and contains a lot of useful information interspersed with a lot of fluff (qualitative information) from both DTE and Itron the manufacturer of the meters.
http://efile.mpsc.state.mi.us/efile/docs/17000/0146.pdf

Answers to many of my questions above are at least partially answered in the above filing.

The power levels of data transmission are so low and infrequent that it is nonsense for anyone to be concerned. We are getting these meters in our county. I have not received one yet, but some residents have. So in a recent newspaper article on the subject substantial space was devoted to some nutty woman claiming adverse effects to her after the meter was installed. In my opinion it is just psychological. See
http://www.annarbor.com/business-re...ublic-service-commission-investigation-conti/

The move has dredged up concerns among smart meter skeptics, who have filed a steady stream of complaints with the Michigan Public Service Commission.

Among the concerned citizens is Ann Arbor retiree Rebecca Morr, who said in an email that she began to feel ?jittery? and experienced ?a buzzing vibration in my head? after crews installed a smart meter at her Gloucester Way home on March 10.

?I really am concerned about people who may be more at risk for problems: the elderly, people with prior conditions, people like me who already have sensitivities, and especially for children,? Morr said in the email.

Morr, recounting her experience after her smart meter was installed, said she began to feel strange sensations after walking to her kitchen sink, which shares a wall with the smart meter on the outside.

Morr said that, as a practitioner of Bikram Yoga, she was checking her blood pressure that day. She said it spiked from 118/72 before the installation to 165/89 afterward, leading her to contact DTE to request the removal of her smart meter.

I believe if this woman was put in a controlled experiment you could get all kinds of different results depending upon the experiment. Since she knows that electronic meters are being installed I suspect that if her mechanical spinning disk meter was replaced with a "mechanical" (old technology) meter with a drum type digital display she would still feel these effects. Her Bikram Yoga (a high temperature stressful yoga) probably causes vastly more potential harm than a smart meter.

Personally I have been exposed to much higher power density levels in my earlier years than this woman has ever experienced. I never noticed any effect, except from radio diathermy which was expected to internally heat one's body.
http://www.fda.gov/ICECI/Inspections/InspectionGuides/ucm071626.htm

.

 

[ramsy]

SmartMeterDangers.org has consolidated educational and scientific information to the public about health effects and other problems related to wireless smart meters.

Evidence depends on proximity of meters, some radiation measurements are higher than cell phones. Site references at least one utility removing the smart meters & replacing with analog.

 

[texie]

120329-1003 EDT

In your area how do so called "smart meters" work? Questions like:
1. What is measured?
Current separately in each leg or the sum of the two legs, power of each leg or just the sum, voltage on each leg or the sum, short time peak power, power factor, etc.
What is the sampling rate, whose chip, short time averaging time, longer time averaging time, how long is data stored in meter, etc.
2. How often is data communicated to power company?
Is it on command, or just randomly sent. If randomly sent and collisions occur how does the meter know to resend?
3. Can the meter be disabled remotely? Meaning is there an internal contactor.
4. What is peak power during transmission, carrier frequency, and data transmission duration?
5. Is there public resistance to installing these meters?

References:
http://www.michigan.gov/mpsc/0,4639,7-159-16400_17280-269136--,00.html

An illustration of some of the nonsense from customers
http://efile.mpsc.state.mi.us/efile/docs/17000/0102.pdf

Following is a copy of DTE's filing with the MPSC. It is long and contains a lot of useful information interspersed with a lot of fluff (qualitative information) from both DTE and Itron the manufacturer of the meters.
http://efile.mpsc.state.mi.us/efile/docs/17000/0146.pdf

Answers to many of my questions above are at least partially answered in the above filing.

The power levels of data transmission are so low and infrequent that it is nonsense for anyone to be concerned. We are getting these meters in our county. I have not received one yet, but some residents have. So in a recent newspaper article on the subject substantial space was devoted to some nutty woman claiming adverse effects to her after the meter was installed. In my opinion it is just psychological. See
http://www.annarbor.com/business-re...ublic-service-commission-investigation-conti/


I believe if this woman was put in a controlled experiment you could get all kinds of different results depending upon the experiment. Since she knows that electronic meters are being installed I suspect that if her mechanical spinning disk meter was replaced with a "mechanical" (old technology) meter with a drum type digital display she would still feel these effects. Her Bikram Yoga (a high temperature stressful yoga) probably causes vastly more potential harm than a smart meter.

Personally I have been exposed to much higher power density levels in my earlier years than this woman has ever experienced. I never noticed any effect, except from radio diathermy which was expected to internally heat one's body.
http://www.fda.gov/ICECI/Inspections/InspectionGuides/ucm071626.htm

.

I suspect that many of these people who think that smart meters are affecting their health have no problem sitting in Starbucks surfing the net on WiFi all day while talking on their cell phone.
I think the concept of smart meters is wonderful and makes good business sense if properly used and financed properly. The problem I have with it is it has evolved from being a business decision based on economic reality to a tool to promote a social agenda that is not based on the real cost of producing and delivering electricity to a retail customer.
The entire electric rate setting process has become perverted to the point that it is not based on simple business economics of cost and a fair rate of return on investment. Take tiered rates as an example. IMHO tiered rates are purely socialistic. Demand and/or time of use rates are a different matter as they can be justified by real numbers.
I realize my comments may run afoul the Moderater(s) rules, but I think it is fair game in this context.

 

[rattus]

120329-1003 EDT

In your area how do so called "smart meters" work? Questions like:
1. What is measured?
Current separately in each leg or the sum of the two legs, power of each leg or just the sum, voltage on each leg or the sum, short time peak power, power factor, etc.
What is the sampling rate, whose chip, short time averaging time, longer time averaging time, how long is data stored in meter, etc.
2. How often is data communicated to power company?
Is it on command, or just randomly sent. If randomly sent and collisions occur how does the meter know to resend?
3. Can the meter be disabled remotely? Meaning is there an internal contactor.
4. What is peak power during transmission, carrier frequency, and data transmission duration?
5. Is there public resistance to installing these meters?

References:
http://www.michigan.gov/mpsc/0,4639,7-159-16400_17280-269136--,00.html

An illustration of some of the nonsense from customers
http://efile.mpsc.state.mi.us/efile/docs/17000/0102.pdf

Following is a copy of DTE's filing with the MPSC. It is long and contains a lot of useful information interspersed with a lot of fluff (qualitative information) from both DTE and Itron the manufacturer of the meters.
http://efile.mpsc.state.mi.us/efile/docs/17000/0146.pdf

Answers to many of my questions above are at least partially answered in the above filing.

The power levels of data transmission are so low and infrequent that it is nonsense for anyone to be concerned. We are getting these meters in our county. I have not received one yet, but some residents have. So in a recent newspaper article on the subject substantial space was devoted to some nutty woman claiming adverse effects to her after the meter was installed. In my opinion it is just psychological. See
http://www.annarbor.com/business-re...ublic-service-commission-investigation-conti/


I believe if this woman was put in a controlled experiment you could get all kinds of different results depending upon the experiment. Since she knows that electronic meters are being installed I suspect that if her mechanical spinning disk meter was replaced with a "mechanical" (old technology) meter with a drum type digital display she would still feel these effects. Her Bikram Yoga (a high temperature stressful yoga) probably causes vastly more potential harm than a smart meter.

Personally I have been exposed to much higher power density levels in my earlier years than this woman has ever experienced. I never noticed any effect, except from radio diathermy which was expected to internally heat one's body.
http://www.fda.gov/ICECI/Inspections/InspectionGuides/ucm071626.htm

.

In the Dallas area, many users complained that their electric bills spiked after the meters were installed. TXU says it was because we had an unusual spell of cold weather or was it hot weather?

When I worked for the typewriter company, one lady complained that the electricity in her hands triggered the keys prematurely. Truth is, only the motor was electric. Electric typewriters had been around since about 1925 BTW. Some people are impressionable.

 

[K8MHZ]

Here are the specs for smart meters that use RF for querying. Not all do. Some use the AC lines to do it.

Q) Do you mean smart meters contain an intentional RF transmitter?

A) Sometimes. When a smart meter contains an RF transmitter:

The frequency of operation is typically in the 902 MHz and 2.4 GHz bands.

Power output is typically 1 watt in the 902 MHz band and much less in the 2.4 GHz band.

The intended range of a transmitter in a smart meter is typically very localized. While the utility-side radio needs to reach a neighborhood concentrator, typically mounted on a nearby pole, smart meters can also mesh through other smart meters to communicate with the concentrator. (using five hops or less) See Figure 2.

The smart meter only communicates when it is commanded to do so, typically several times a day.

The smart meter’s transmitter operates under Part 15 of the FCC rules.

http://www.arrl.org/smart-meters

The smart meters that use RF have levels very similar to WiFi routers and cell phones.

The meters only send when pinged, and that is a packet of info that takes less than a second to transmit. Compare that to the same power and frequency a wireless router uses, and that is on 24/7 and we are generally a few feet from one. Compare it to the power and use of a cell phone, stuck right up against your head.

This smart meter paranoia has been discussed by ham radio operators for years. The first concern was interference to the ham radio bands. There has been none. Trust me, if there was enough RF coming from a smart meter to hurt someone, that would easily be picked up by full spectrum receivers, like most ham radio rigs have.

If you want to pick on a device that really is in violation of FCC rules, check out plasma TV's. They can wipe out an entire radio band from many yards away. They literally spew RF and EMF. The FCC won't do anything about them except on individual complaints, and then all they do is tell the owner of the TV to stop using it as it is interfering with a licensed service.

But you never hear of these whackos getting sick from plasma TV's, do you?

Electric fences can spew EMF and RF for MILES. Any complaints about those making people sick?

Battery chargers spew EMF and RF for yards, so do fish tank heaters, touch lamps and waterbed heaters. No complaints, and think about sleeping in a water bed heated with a heater that creates enough RF to make a radio band un-usable for up to 100 feet or so.

Turn on your AM radio and set it to a weak station and drive around town. Hear all that garbage? That's EMF and RF that we have been living with for a century.

 

[Open Neutral]

A) A bigger issue is they are excellent surveillance tools. You can tell when someone is home, or away; guess what's going on by the load, etc. Bad enough Big Brother gets real time tracking on you; but also ideal for the gang of burglars. <i>But the PoCo assured me it was securely stored...</i>

B) At least in PGE's case, I gotta ask "What WERE you thinking...?" The electric meters act as hubs for each other; so long as one can reach the pole-mounted dual-ground plane access point, itself fed via cellular data...all can. Yes, Ma, your meter <i>is</s> tweeting.

But the gas meters, with limited power [LiOn battery] vs the electric's unlimited??? THEY can not relay via an electric meter...and must reach the access point unaided.

 

[Hv&Lv]

A) A bigger issue is they are excellent surveillance tools. You can tell when someone is home, or away; guess what's going on by the load, etc. Bad enough Big Brother gets real time tracking on you; but also ideal for the gang of burglars. <i>But the PoCo assured me it was securely stored...</i>

B) At least in PGE's case, I gotta ask "What WERE you thinking...?" The electric meters act as hubs for each other; so long as one can reach the pole-mounted dual-ground plane access point, itself fed via cellular data...all can. Yes, Ma, your meter <i>is</s> tweeting.

But the gas meters, with limited power [LiOn battery] vs the electric's unlimited??? THEY can not relay via an electric meter...and must reach the access point unaided.

Now realistically, how in the world will a smart meter know if someone is home or not? Load can be a factor, but not a determining factor. Ours are data over power line transmitters. They do not transmit unless we "ping" them and download the information. We really don't care if anyone is home or not. We just want the kWh & kW information without having to pay a meter reader. This way we can see if the XF is too small or too large. Another BIG plus, on an outage, we can ping the meters, and see where to start looking for problems. It is also a blessing when looking for causes of blinking lights, ours will also record blinks.

 

[iwire]

Smart meters are going to be used to control peoples minds and make them buy the products that the power company chooses.

 

[ActionDave]

And we are powerless against them. Soon the only free thinkers in the country will be the Amish.

 

[Open Neutral]

Now realistically, how in the world will a smart meter know if someone is home or not?

There have been some studies, and it's far more revealing that you might think.

Here are just a few:
http://csrc.nist.gov/publications/nistir/ir7628/nistir-7628_vol2.pdf
http://epic.org/privacy/smartgrid/Smart_Meter_TACD_Resolution_FINAL.pdf

Here's an overview:
http://epic.org/privacy/smartgrid/smartgrid.html

Load can be a factor, but not a determining factor. Ours are data over power line transmitters. They do not transmit unless we "ping" them and download the information. We really don't care if anyone is home or not. We just want the kWh & kW information without having to pay a meter reader. This way we can see if the XF is too small or too large.

Another BIG plus, on an outage, we can ping the meters, and see where to start looking for problems. It is also a blessing when looking for causes of blinking lights, ours will also record blinks.

Seldom does a sword have one edge. The real-time availability is no different. I can easily see the DEA buffoons showing up and demanding tracking of any house they've decided must be a grow-op, for example, despite Kyllo_v._United_States.

 

[hillbilly1]

And we are powerless against them. Soon the only free thinkers in the country will be the Amish.

Even the Amish are being corrupted, many now hire modern day farmers to bale their hay for them. My uncle owns an automotive electric business that is near several Amish farms, so they bring ice cream for him to store in his freezer until they need it. They already use diesel engines on their sawmills.

 

[mivey]

Seldom does a sword have one edge. The real-time availability is no different. I can easily see the DEA buffoons showing up and demanding tracking of any house they've decided must be a grow-op, for example, despite Kyllo_v._United_States.

And they may get similar results where the conviction is over-turned. Detection grow-ops does not require a smart meter as a standard meter can detect the grow-op as well.

Usage patterns are a different story but all meters are destined to go that way eventually. Wholesale power costs includes short-interval costs and to properly pass along costs, the retail meter should gather short-interval data. It has not been done in the past for small loads because it was cost prohibitive to install that type metering, but it is the best way to track cost causation. Large customers already are already metered this way.

Data security is always an issue, just like it is with the POCO having your SS#, driver's license #, bank account #, etc. and Smart meters won't change that fact.

PS: Some small loads already have profiling meters installed that are used to build customer class load profiles for cost allocation purposes. It is a necessary function for cost allocation and rate design.

 

[Rampage_Rick]

Our utility is BC Hydro and they're installing Itron C2SOD smart meters.

1. What is measured?
You can see our exact model of meter being assembled here. It appears to have a CT on each leg of the service, and potential voltage (and power for the meter itself) is across both legs. As I understand Itron's design their metrology boards (which make the measurements) are universal, it's the rest of the meter "smarts" that are customized for each utility. I believe the actual measurements recorded by our meters here are kWh incoming total, kWh outgoing total, line voltage, and frequency, with 1-hour intervals between readings. There are many more "register configurations" listed on the spec sheet. It appears the "advanced" options like power factor are only available on polyphase meters.

2. How often is data communicated to power company?
It's my understanding that these meters are configured to send data 3 times per day at a set time (say 6AM, 2PM, and 10PM) Of course the utility can query an individual meter at any time if they need to.

3. Can the meter be disabled remotely? Meaning is there an internal contactor.
Ours can. You can actually see it being assembled in the video linked above. There's also a button on the front of the meter that has something to do with the remote disconnect feature. I'm not sure of the exact function, but there are a few possibilities. The first is that once you've paid up they want you to turn the power on yourself, so that they're not liable for damage. It's more plausible that the button allows limited usage while being disconnected, either giving you a set number of minutes for each press, or a set wattage at which the meter "trips" and you have to reset it.

4. What is peak power during transmission, carrier frequency, and data transmission duration?
Ours output 650 mW at 900 Mhz for the Openway mesh network, and have a Zigbee module which outputs 60 mW @ 2.4 Ghz. The Zigbee unit is activated at the homeowner's request, and allows smart appliances to talk to the meter. The meters should only transmit data a couple times a day, however the mesh network does require constant upkeep, and as such the meters do chatter amongst themselves a couple of times per minute. It's no different than your cell phone keeping in contact with the cell towers at all times, just a blip here and there.

5. Is there public resistance to installing these meters?
And how!!! BC seems to have the lion's share of crazies. Some of the stuff I'm hearing is borderline plausible but many of the arguments I hear are a level of paranoia or ignorance that I can't fathom. I previously posted an article claiming that smart meters emit enough RF to start fires. I just read a brilliant piece from a person claiming "I am very sensitive to electro-magnetic waves and microwaves and if I am in a 'mood,' can cause computers to fail." :happysad::happysad::happysad::happysad:

I love how these protesters constantly parrot how the World Health Organization classified EMF as a Class 2B possible carcinogen, meanwhile the same WHO ran double-blind studies and found that so-called Electromagnetic Hypersensitivity has no scientific basis and is in all probability a psychosomatic or "nocebo" effect. Of course, reciting a list of other Class 2B possible carcinogens doesn't sway them either, despite the fact that many others are also generally accepted and commonplace. (pickled vegetables, printer toner, and coffee, anyone?)

 

[kwired]

If you don't want a smart meter you can always install on site generation and be independent from the utilities.

If you use a system that requires you to purchase fuel there is still a record somewhere of how much fuel was purchased.

Information that may be collected by a smart meter is used for betterment of the system not to rip off the consumer. Rates are going to increase with or without smart meters - because energy costs are going to increase. The smart meters may actually help slow down the rate of increase in some ways.

 

[Open Neutral]

Even the Amish are being corrupted, many now hire modern day farmers to bale their hay for them. My uncle owns an automotive electric business that is near several Amish farms, so they bring ice cream for him to store in his freezer until they need it. They already use diesel engines on their sawmills.

This is OT, but to understand the Amish, realize many of their "rules" are such to keep church activity the center of the community. You can't phone the cute girl next door, but you'll see her at church. A phone booth that is used only to call outsider suppliers is not a threat to that; a pickup that the 16 YO boy can drive to town to meet outsider girls is...