Smart Meters (UK)

Like you Mike I don't know true advantages or disadvantages.so I have opted not to upgrade my existing meter and will only move over to a smart meter when forced to.

scott

 I received my "invitation" the other day, I rang the specified phone number to ask how the smart meters handle current flow from the house to the grid as I have some solar panels.  The person did not know so I declined to make an appointment to have the smart meters installed. I also told then that there were lots of houses with solar panels in this area so they were not going to get many smart meters installed in this area.

I asked the person how the meter communicated to the base, they said that they used a SIM card to enable contact via the mobile phone network. To give them further joy I told them that we lived in a poor reception area for cell phones.

Mike - Like you i have no real need for one as i submit readings on a monthly basis and know exactly how we use our energy from measuring it myself over the years. I've read the various reports (some people really shouldn't have access to the public internet...) and decided that i have no problem with a smart meter being installed. I can't see that these things will cause any health concerns above anything that is already in most peoples homes - wireless devices, Wi-Fi networks and mobile phones etc.

Two main things for me -  

How the measurement is peformed - it seems that it's conventional (shunt method or current transformer) so no concerns there over altering the mains source impedance. 

It has to be a GSM type rather than anything that uses the mains feed for any Powerline comms to the local substation.

Getting our energy supplier to actually fit one though is another story...

We have one fitted and have not noticed any changes to the sound of our system.  I have to say my husband is extremely disappointed that we can't access the data it sends, so in our case it is obviously more beneficial to the supplier than us!

One thing to consider is that smart meters actually use some power therefore your electricity bills will go up slightly.

I cannot see the point of them from the customers perspective.

The Naim's Dave posted:

One thing to consider is that smart meters actually use some power therefore your electricity bills will go up slightly.

I cannot see the point of them from the customers perspective.

Surely the power for the meter is taken from the supplier side of the meter current sensor rather than the consumer side so the supplier bears the (very) small loss (although i wouldn't say energy companies are the most honest...)

Who gives the supplier the money to pay for the small amount of power?

The customer.

I may well consider one if upon fitting the fitter was willing to split the tails.I would then be one step closer to my dedicated hifi supply.

I somehow dought they would be willing.

Scott

I have so far declined the offer of a smart meter - I see it as a back door route by the energy suppliers to charge more for electricity use at peak times.  Perhaps I'm being cynical?  

then the suppliers will say that only with a smart meter can they charge a reduced rate at off peak times (which will be the current rate before smart meters are introduced.

Chris G posted:

I have so far declined the offer of a smart meter - I see it as a back door route by the energy suppliers to charge more for electricity use at peak times.  Perhaps I'm being cynical?  

Perhaps. But it's worth considering why they charge what they do. Can they charge whatever they like? If so, why don't they put prices up and make more profit? Why muck around with new meters? How do smart meters change the regulatory or market forces that have previously determined prices? The suppliers are correct in wanting to encourage off- peak use to smooth demand. This lowers their infrastructure costs. Do they take all that as profit? Do they share the benefits?

It's complex, but if there were no price control factors, you'd be spending every spare penny on electricity. Smart meters don't remove the factors that control electricity prices.

Chris G posted:

I have so far declined the offer of a smart meter - I see it as a back door route by the energy suppliers to charge more for electricity use at peak times.  Perhaps I'm being cynical?  

Cynical ??  I would call it wary & wise based on mistrust founded on big bother/large corporation price fixing cartel scams from the past.

Tks for feedback folks;   my will I or won't I  thinking has been going around  ......... sometime in the future we will probably get charged extra for not having a SM (charged for non-standard meter reading)    The UK.Gov has set a targt of 2020 to have the whole country installed & I have a sneaky suspicion that will open the approval door for charging for not having a SM.  But what else will happen up to & then in 2020 !!   All the brexit ups & downs, then an election ....... & they're only politicians (bless 'em) so it could all change anyhow.    It will be a way of banding off peak but will they ever do that considering the competition & ease of switching suppliers.     Winky sez SM's won't control 'lecky prices but it raises the awareness of  consumption & economy with the gen. public & it will be harder for the utilities, distribution & generators to get away with what went on in the past.    I will probably pull the trigger, maybe next week, but still gathering info.

Chris G posted:

I have so far declined the offer of a smart meter - I see it as a back door route by the energy suppliers to charge more for electricity use at peak times.  Perhaps I'm being cynical?  

I am open minded. I spoke to EON when they were having a promotional push on Smart Meters on whether  EON could confirm that they would not cause any RF interference. I was eventually put in contact with a very helpful back office  team (it felt like a very small team) where I explained and talked through this further and what I needed EON to confirm. The  eventual answer was that EON would not recommend a smart meter installation for my situation because they couldn't guarantee no interference side effects, they were apologetic but said I should not be concerned as they were purely optional anyway.

I have since looked into it and reasonably confident they should be ok from EMF health perspective - but not neccessarily interference on the 2.4GHz ISM band  through the use of the Zigbee wireless network affecting wifi - If there was  interference issues from it I felt it was unlikely to be able to have my Smart Meter removed - especially as EON wouldn't underwrite this. As my meter would be in the main part of my house and not in an outbuilding this was an unacceptable risk to me.

I have had the pain from PLAs in the past which resulted in my having to call in Ofcom in the end to have them removed ..-  I am not suggesting Smart Meters are anywhere near as potentially harmful or EMF polluting as PLAs but it makes me wary...

Edit and even British Gas say it could interfere with your Wifi and you might need to change router wifi channels... assuming you can through congestion

https://www.britishgas.co.uk/h...e-with-my-Wi-Fi.html

Simon

Hi Simon,  I have read up on Zigbee & its seems to be of no real concern with smart meters as it has very low power, low data rate & a  range suitable only for use in a typical UK home.  Its narrow band channels fit between the wide channel bands of 2.4GHz wifi. Together with all the other potential RFI offenders we have already it seems like a drop in the ocean.  My only near neighbour has meters installed & I've been walking around outside with my sniffer but I can't see it/them as an extra TX to the usual 4 or 6 wifi hubs in range

Mike - the 803.11 based wifi channels overlap with each other from a spectrum point of view - they are not seperately contiguous  - so not sure how your statement can apply or it might be referring to marketing high level generalisations. All I can see is that the protocols need to co-reside with each other on the same spectrum which ideally should not be an issue but can be where issues arise in my professional experience where wifi is congested or quality or range is poor.

Simon

Hardly a statement Simon,  & I said they fit between the wide wifi channels where routers auto select ch 1, 6 & 11.   

It might be in a crowed neighbourhood that a user has a need to select one of the in between channels,  but that does mean it part overlaps two of the default channels.  However all this is speculative & having got this same information from numbers of sources including coms engineers,  it seems the Zigbee interference is not common (one guy said its no problem)  but BG & others might need to / be required to cover the possibility.  

Mike - that is a high level marketing diagram , At the radio spectrum level the channels bleed into each other

anyway up to you - having to deal with an issue potentially caused by this right now (professionally).....

I will let the forum know some time after 12 noon next wednesday ............... the button has been pressed.  

Good - if you have low noise levels and good signal levels and not too congested you should notice no or marginal difference. However do ensure you keep long preambles enabled - it reduces wifi efficiency but helps robustness - and i think its the only option BT Homehubs - which I think you are using?

Yes I'm BT.  Also wrt my neighbourhood, congestion is something I don't have,   as I write this I can only detect my own hub,  & the most I have detected from my lounge or study (ground floor) is 3 others & they are very low level (coming & going) & maybe up to another 3 if I take a laptop or tablet upstairs.   So I really don't foresee a problem,  but would be good to hear from any city/apartment users that have (or have not).   

I've also got hold of a smart meter training manual,  it hints at Zigbee auto selecting the optimum (quiet) channel.  More digging required.

From the installer & troubleshooting manual I find the following on avoiding WiFi interference

The small infrequent ZigBee packets are not affected by WiFi & WiFi normally treats ZeeBee as background noise & it's worked around.   They advise to be aware of a potential problem & to select a ZigBee channel that does not interfere with the actual installations strong house/office WiFi channel(s) & that low level nearby area (neighbourhood) WiFi should not pose a problem.  It talks about WiFi routers auto-selecting/defaulting to WiFi channels 1,6 & 11 & that Zigbee channels 15,20 & 25 are ideal mid points & also channel 26 is clear of all WiFi channels (in UK).      

Hi Mike - yes should be treated as another form of wifi interference. However routers often can be set to choose the freest channel from interference and some APs and clients can negotiate a channel as after all the ISM band is a bit of a free for all. The optimum channel to use is not necessarily limited to to just 1,6,11 - but I suspect some more basic  wifi routers  might be limited here for simplicity and reduced cost.

I also find a wifi channel monitor quite useful for setting up optimum channels - and my monitor can also see signal quality and SNR - that is how noisy a particular channel is. I have just looked at my monitor for my locale and I can see several BT devices sticking to channel 1 and 11, but channel 1 devices have  definite reduced SNR and so may be competing with other services such as Zigbee or it could be the devices are simply further away.

If your wifi is strong none of this should be an issue - especially with running long preamble - these sorts of issues arise when you are operating more on the edge of capability not least because wifi and Zigbee both use CSMA/CA. I tend to set my 2.4 channels on either channel 5,6 or 7 depending on what gives best SNR.

Simon,  all my BT hubs (2,3,4 & 5) have the ability to select channels 1 thru 13,  but they all had automatic channel selection set as standard & I suspect thats the way 95%(+)  are used in UK.  The auto channel selection seems to use 1,6 &11 (as far as I could tell)   & believe me in the hair pulling bad ol' days of HH2 & HH3,  I got well used to playing with all the numbers available.   

My wifi channel monitor tells me I'm the only guy in the village most times,  but when I do see them its always 6 & 11.  So I'm locked on ch-1 (& 44 for 5GHz)

indeed - unless you know what you are doing I would always leave to auto... and if you have very few networks around i just don't think you will have any issues at all - but if you go to a house in a suburban housing estate or an office in the middle of town - the scenario looks very different ...... and there will be lots of competing services for the same bandwidth.

On your SmartMeter can you tell the Zigbee what channels to use and possibly avoid?

BTW on 5Ghz I use the UNI-2 Ext block and DFS Channel 108 for optimum 80MHz channel width . I find the UNI-1 and UNI-2 block (channel 36 to 60 ) can get quite congested or prone to interference and should really be limited to 40Mhz channels. One of the challenges with many of the  DFS 5Ghz channels is that they share the same bandwidth with RADAR services and to be compliant if they hear RADAR services on a channel they have to cease and swap channel... but that is another subject 

S

Simon-in-Suffolk posted:

On your SmartMeter can you tell the Zigbee what channels to use and possibly avoid?

I'll find out on Wednesday

I played around the 5GHz channels & apart from getting extra power (which I don't need)  I don't see the point of anything outside the ch 36-64 block as I'm the only user 5GHz,  but I've switched to 108 to see if it does anything extra - 1W vs 200mW might get reception in the lower paddock.