I don't seen an inherent problem with this as long as participation remains voluntary, if or when it is required I can see "Hardware Hackers" doing a brisk business disabling the device that communicates with the smart meter
Because it's so much better to waste a little food than to use a little electricity at the wrong time... I bought an 'energy star' fridge last year. The new fridge is a miniscule part of my electricity consumption.
You want to put peak usage under utility control? Then let the utility control the items responsible for afternoon peaks, the air conditioners.
I KNOW!!! Why don't we control the electricity to one of the most power hogs in the nation - Teh Gubbment! Shut down or reduce THEIR power to their air conditioners during peak usage times in the heat of the day/late afternoon.
My favorite trick for several years has been to plug their sewer pipes with concrete. Now I have a new idea - sabotage their air conditioning/heating units so they won't use any electricity (or natural gas) and let the Gubmint Goobers either FREEZE in the winter or ROAST in the summer. WOW, this gives a whole new meaning to the idea of "Resist a Corrupt Government". I guess it could be considered a Guerilla War.
Years ago I serviced A/C units at an apartment complex that had an agreement with the local utility to randomly power units down during peak hours, without the consent of the tenant. It is incredibly easy to bypass this, and I'm sure when they make it mandatory for other appliances we'll find ways to bypass that also.
New appliance control boards include a comm node to talk to the meter and the grid operators. Operators can probably query meters individually or in groups and send shutdown instructions to any appliance with the comm function. The smart grid will avoid building of new capacity by allowing load shedding on a massive scale. But since the loads shed may not all be in a contiguous area you will never know what's going on. Operators won't have to pull the plug on whole neighborhoods, they'll distribute the shut downs to avoid attention. Brave new world, all aboard.
This "problem" is easily fixed by pricing electricity use properly, the same way they do it for some businesses. That is, you are charged not only for the overall electricity consumption, but also for the peak demand. This would give people the incentive to reduce the peak demand THEIR way, not by some centralized food-trashing command.
Peak demand is a problem - unless folks are OK with brownouts...
9 comments:
I don't seen an inherent problem with this as long as participation remains voluntary, if or when it is required I can see "Hardware Hackers" doing a brisk business disabling the device that communicates with the smart meter
Because it's so much better to waste a little food than to use a little electricity at the wrong time...
I bought an 'energy star' fridge last year. The new fridge is a miniscule part of my electricity consumption.
You want to put peak usage under utility control? Then let the utility control the items responsible for afternoon peaks, the air conditioners.
this has been in the works for
some time. netsearch on "smart
meters". all the best, cycjec
I KNOW!!! Why don't we control the electricity to one of the most power hogs in the nation - Teh Gubbment! Shut down or reduce THEIR power to their air conditioners during peak usage times in the heat of the day/late afternoon.
B Woodman
III-per
As simple as I can put it is "Fuck That".
My favorite trick for several years has been to plug their sewer pipes with concrete. Now I have a new idea - sabotage their air conditioning/heating units so they won't use any electricity (or natural gas) and let the Gubmint Goobers either FREEZE in the winter or ROAST in the summer. WOW, this gives a whole new meaning to the idea of "Resist a Corrupt Government". I guess it could be considered a Guerilla War.
Years ago I serviced A/C units at an apartment complex that had an agreement with the local utility to randomly power units down during peak hours, without the consent of the tenant. It is incredibly easy to bypass this, and I'm sure when they make it mandatory for other appliances we'll find ways to bypass that also.
This is how it will play out:
New appliance control boards include a comm node to talk to the meter and the grid operators.
Operators can probably query meters individually or in groups and send shutdown instructions to any appliance with the comm function.
The smart grid will avoid building of new capacity by allowing load shedding on a massive scale. But since the loads shed may not all be in a contiguous area you will never know what's going on. Operators won't have to pull the plug on whole neighborhoods, they'll distribute the shut downs to avoid attention.
Brave new world, all aboard.
This "problem" is easily fixed by pricing electricity use properly, the same way they do it for some businesses. That is, you are charged not only for the overall electricity consumption, but also for the peak demand. This would give people the incentive to reduce the peak demand THEIR way, not by some centralized food-trashing command.
Peak demand is a problem - unless folks are OK with brownouts...
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