Smart Meters: Should You Get One?

[Chris Hogg]

Channel 5, Wednesday 31 January 21:00 - 21:58 or again Saturday 3 February 17:55 - 18:40

Had mine for over two years now and it behaves just as it should AFAICT.

[Andy Bennett]

Me too - allows you to use smart tariffs. I average around 19MWh/year (electric heating, electric cars) and my average unit price over the last year worked out at 16.7p/kWh.

Being a member of the tin hat brigade will likely cost you thousands.

[Robert]

+1 Smart Tariffs are the future. On Octopus Agile, no solar, batteries or EV and use electric oven during peak time but still 20p/kWh over last 6 months on 8kWhs per day.

[The Natural Philosopher]

Sure. Like your solar panels on the roof, electric car and electric heat pumps, all of which will fail if the grid goes down, while I will still at least have an oil fired system that is currently the cheapest way overall to heat my house and run my car.

'Smart Tariffs are the future'

Do you want to buy a bridge?

I remember being assured back around 2010 that by 2020 Britain would be running off 100% renewables .

And reading in some small print that beyond around 30% renewables the cost would escalate exponentially, which it duly has.

There's one born every minute...

[Andy Bennett]

So presumably you have a battery inverter system to operate your 'oil' boiler and circulation pump??

Same problem with gas heating - still needs electricity to run it.

Our 2 EV's together do a total of about 15000 miles per year, which would cost about £2000 in petrol. If you take that off our £3100 leccy bill (including standing charge)then I think an £1100 bill to heat a large 4 bed detached a day at 21C quite acceptable. This of course includes cooking/lighting etc etc.

[Alan Lee]

So you've got a generator to keep your boiler going when the Grid is down then? Just like we have with an all electric house. 5.5kWh, If the batteries run out, the generator can be turned on. Typical grid drop outs here are less than 10 minutes (rural SW Scotland), so the batteries usually take over, and can run anything until they deplete. We can't have the hob on with the generator, but the Heat Pump will run fine(approx 3 kw max demand from that from cold). There's nothing else in the house with a high load that is essential (hoover, kettle etc are not essential).

[Andrew]

Not quite, it definitely isn't 'free', Ofgem are allowing the energy suppliers to make more money from the increases in the daily standing charge in the future than the cost of installing them.

[Andrew]

But you are avoiding the fuel duty and 20% VAT on the fuel duty that raises a lot of money. This is only a temporary advantage, at some point the government will need to take measures to collect this missing revenue by other means.

Inverters have limited lifetimes, and when replacement is needed (and typically without warning at a very inconvenient time) getting someone to fit a new one could be expensive.

[Andy Bennett]

I live for the moment. My strategy will change when the rules change.

I don't have an inverter.

[The Natural Philosopher]

No. I have a gravity fed aga, which at a pinch would keep me warm, and I COULD buy a diesel generator for the central heating and refrigerators

I dont have gas.

[The Natural Philosopher]

No. I have a gravity fed aga and open fires

[charles]

Doesn't the boiler need some form of electricity to keep going? Doesn't the hot water get pumped around the pipework?

[The Natural Philosopher]

I have an Aga deary. I don't NEED central heating or hot water for the duration of a power cut

My car will still run.

My open fires will still burn.

And overall I don't have to rip my neighbours off with subsidies they pay for, avoid road tax and fuel tax, and in general be a complete social parasite

AND my heating costs are lower than electricity and a heat pump can manage.

[alan_m]

Which you will still pay if you don't have a smart meter. Even the old dumb meters weren't free - the consumer paid or them in some way.

[charles]

AGAs can power central heating.

[alan_m]

I'll bet that it will be a whole hour of the problems that people will have had with smart meters and billing, ignoring similar problem people have had with the older meters in the past.

[The Natural Philosopher]

Mine doesn't. I need a lot more cenfral heating than that :-)

[The Natural Philosopher]

I have never had a problem with an electricity meter, ever.

[Jeff Layman]

+1

Isn't it a strange coincidence that so many now seem to be going "out of calibration" and nearly all replacements available are smart meters? Even if they're connected up only in "dumb" mode I wonder how long it would take to reactivate them as full smart meters? Could it be done remotely by the electricity supplier?

[Davey]

My 'out of calibration' meter suddenly had no calibration concerns when I refused a 'smart' meter as replacement.