"Smart" Meters made them sick

[trader4]

As are probably 95% of the rest of the installed ones.

[gfretwell]

Where is that? Jimmy Carter land?

Have you heard about natural gas?

[gfretwell]

Obama had nothing to do with it. 99% of the old analog meters were worn out and reading low. They needed to be replaced anyway, just to recover lost revenue. When you add the value to the bottom line of laying off all the meter readers, it is a win-win for the poco.

[Pete C.]

That's only part of the story.

There are three main benefits to smart meters:

1. They replaced aging analog meters that were inaccurate, failing, etc.
2. They eliminated meter readers, and reading errors (and a few jobs).
3. Since smart meters can log usage based on time of day, they allow incentives to be offered for consumers to use more power during off peak times and less during peak times. Already we see utilities offering promotions such as "free nights" to encourage people to do laundry or whatever in the evenings. This peak shifting effort helps reduce the need to build new generating facilities and also helps to reduce the peak loads on aging transmission circuits.

[Robert Green]

Smart meters enable the power company to easily determine what areas and customers are without power after a major storm. Without power at the meter, they do not report in and that information can be used to draw up maps of what areas need the greatest repair resources.

No, it's not an "Obama green energy boondoggle" but thinking so could easily be characterized as "Obama Derangement Syndrome" especially when obvious benefits of the new technology are overlooked in an attempt to score some pretty small political points. Sheesh.

Smart businessmen should realize that some people are willing to pay a premium for "green" things and capitalize on that willingness to spend. Dumb ones kvetch about it but don't make a cent.

[dennisgauge]

NO NO NO!

You are clouding the issue with facts and logic.

Obama did it.

(Don't mention that the power company first installed a smart meter at the farm in the early 1990's. Did the whole peak/off peak bit, and allowed the meter readers to download the data from inside their trucks. It's still Obama's fault.)

[harry]

I have PV panels on my house roof that feed back into the grid. Quite a lot of my neighbours have them too.

[trader4]

If it's all so important and economically viable for the utilities, pays for itself, etc, then why did Obama's stimulus pour money we don't have into smart meters? That sure sounds like an Obama green energy boondogle to me. Take money that we don't have and use it to pay for things that should fund themselves.

The smart businessmen were the ones that were politically connected so that they could get the US taxpayers to pay for it. Actually, future USA taxpayers, since a lot of it was borrowed money.

[harry]

Clearly you have never been to Germany. Solar panels are cost effective because they need no fuel to run them. Their projected life is around 25 years. And they produce no pollution once manufactured. You have to buy gasoline to run your generator. You have to maintain it and it has a lifetime of a few thousand hours at best. And the cost of fossil fuels will rise. And fossil fuels are too valuable to burn.

[harry]

2-

Well shitfer that is intentional, it is a safety and cost thing. But you haven't the wit to understand this. There are standalone systems but they are much more expensive.

[Dan Espen]

More corporate welfare or strategic investment in the future:

All depends on your politics. Facts? Not even relevant.

[Moe DeLoughan]

Dedicated to all Right Wing Nutjobs, and the people who laugh at them:

26 Ways President Obama Has Completely Ruined the Country

[harry]

Heh Heh. The cost of all fossil fuels is set to rise. If your fuel can be sold elsewhere for more money. it will be sent there, don't you worry. More fuel has been found but there are lots more people want it. Like the Chinese and Indians.

Meanwhile it is foolish to squander it. You Yanks never learn.

[Moe DeLoughan]

Bang on. This is all about utilities moving to increase profits by cutting costs and creating a variable pricing structure, where they'll charge more during periods of peak demand. It's just a sound business decision, not a conspiracy.

[Moe DeLoughan]

Here we're trying to upgrade our energy infrastructure - which is a vital issue in terms of national defense, by the way - and you're bitching about spending a few billion to help make it happen? Energy demand is forecast to outpace supply, we have a seriously aging infrastructure, the gov't deemed it important for the country to take action to add more production, replace aging lines and facilities, and create a smart-grid, meaning it can react in near-real time to fluctuations in demand. Smart meters are part of that plan.

If *you* want to live in a third-world nation, move to one, instead of endlessly advocating to drag the USA down to that level.

[Sjouke Burry]

harry wrote in news:3c5379c8-51f5-4c8b-a3cf- [e-mail]:

And you have to buy a new Solar DC-AC convertor, when the old one fails after a few years. Want to estimate the cost, when your original supplier is out of bizness? My guessimate comes out at 4 to 8000 dollars/euros. Not to mention, what replacing one or two failing panels costs.

25 years without maintenance costs is quite impossible.... You need panels with the same properties.........

[Dan Espen]

A few years?

My first hit on MTBF for DC-AC converter says 1 million hours.

365*24 = 8760. Looks like 114 years.

Seems a little high, but a few years sounds nuts.

Those Chinese must be pretty clever if they can sell something like that.

[Ralph Mowery]

Here is a real world example of solar power. I have known the fellow for over 30 years and have listened to two short speaches of his . One about 2 years ago and another this week.

For his house, he usually has a surplus of power he sends back to the power grid. One of his last power bills was showing a negative $ 50. The power company will not pay him for the excess powe,but atleast it does not cost him.

I think he said right now you could get about a 60% tax credit so the cost is less than half the list price. He does not put up small 25 watt panels, but 4500 watt panels that are about

16 feet square if I remember right. Don't remember if they were 17,000 each or that was the total of what he had before the tax credit.

One point he made was that everything the power company tells you, do the opposit. One example is he uses metered power. That is he pays for power at the same rate it is bought back at. There is another way that you buy power at a higher rate and they pay you less for your power.

He has lots of good points that many over look.

[Ralph Mowery]

There are now 'microinverters' that only produce about 300 watts and are easy to replace. You do have about 24 of them per panel. With todays cost it only takes about 5 years for a payback when you factor in all the tax breaks in the US.

Again look here for a real user.

[trader4]

022-

Safety thing? Cost thing? Clueless as ever. The essence of the problem is that without the grid, the power from a solar array would vary all over the place. What do you think would happen to your furnace or TV every time a cloud came by?

You haven't the wit to understand that those solar panels mounted on utility poles by the power company are obviously connected to the grid. THAT is what you were replying to.