TinyTim

8.3 Million U.S. Smart Meters and Counting

I like my SRP Elster Smartmeter with a Time of Use rate plan, especially when it's 115F outside.

Glad this article quits mixing smartmeters with smartgrids.
Gas and water meters will be next since the main function is to eliminate meter readers as a cost center.
Smartgas

8.3 Million U.S. Smart Meters and Counting

I like my SRP Elster Smartmeter with a Time of Use rate plan, especially when it's 115F outside.

Glad this article quits mixing smartmeters with smartgrids.
Gas and water meters will be next since the main function is to eliminate meter readers as a cost center.
Smartgas

PowerMeter Deals Continue to Energize Electric Utilities

My local utility SRP has been installing smartmeters for years. Ive also been on time-of-use variable pricing plans for at least 10 years. My newly installed Elster smartmeter allows more flexible and convenient TOU plans (3 hrs on-peak, 5weekdays, summer only).
In addition, when I researched the Elster meter, I noted they are using an open source Zigbee mesh network at the bottom level and open IP at the higher levels. SRP immediately started displaying my daily on/off peak usage on their website, which has been invaluable in identifying and localizing energy consumption.

I suspect it won't be long before a Zigbee card in my computer will allow instantaneous power demand monitoring.

Smart Grids' Year of Growth

Maybe I just have a problem with the name, but SmartGrid is a lot of hype. Blackouts are not a major problem unless Enron is involved.
Smart meters are useful for the limited number of residences that are interested in monitoring and reducing expense -check interest in TOU rates.
Load leveling is a powerful idea for efficiency and reducing carbon. Utilities have had emergency cut-off agreements with large industrial users for years to handle extreme situations. Residential demand rates have been a flop. For normal load leveling, the only thing I see on the horizon is electric vehicle recharge, which has a dual advantage. But even this is bringing up the base load, not reducing the peak.

Cogeneration has had the biggest potential to increase generation efficiency and it's been around for years. Reducing transmission losses is a matter of getting supply and demand closer and using bigger conductors. Accomodating micro-distributed demand (residential solar panels) requires no special networking. What's so smart about that?