Everything You Need To Know About Smart Meters

5 by Beth Buczynski on June 14, 2011

We talk about advances in smart meters and energy monitoring technology all the time, but how much do you really know about how these devices really work?

Smart meters have many advantages over traditional utility meters, and allow for much higher levels of energy efficiency when compared to older consumption tracking technologies.

This infographic will give you a better understanding of the differences between smart meters and traditional meters, and why they present an effective method for reducing inefficiency and conserving electricity.

Created by WellHome Energy Audits
Top Image: Flickr - nblumhardt

Category: Gear+Gadgets, Innovation, Living | Tags: conservation, energy meter, energy monitoring, home energy, smart grid, Technology

About the Author:

Beth is a freelance copy writer and environmental blogger living in Colorado. She has an M.S. in Public Communication and Technology from Colorado State University, and is passionate about inspiring people to live and laugh more sustainably. Follow her on Twitter as @ecosphericblog

Follow Beth Buczynski on Twitter: @ecosphericblog

Daniela

Dear folks at greenupgrader,

Is this on as a comment or not? It is important to know the real truth about the not-so-smart meter program. See for yourself at stopsmartmeters.org and emfsafetynetwork.org.(to name only a few). Did you know that there are protests and moratoriums all over the country…42 cities and counties in Ca. alone? It turns out that they are neither safe, nor sustainable, nor green in any way. In fact, this program is the very opposite of what we want, ie. true conservation, passive solar design with daylighting (light on at least 2 sides of every room), local, and renewable.

Daniela

The Not-So-Smart Meter Program is anything but “smart” or green. I can go right outside my door anytime, 24/7 to see my E use in real time with my much safer analog (hard-wired) electric meter. And I also know how well I conserve energy from my monthly bill. Passive solar design, rooftop solar, light on at least 2 sides of every room are examples of good energy efficiency that are truly green. Either the author is uninformed or she is being paid by the big utilities to give us this propaganda. The truth is that transmitting Not-So-Smart Meters pose a serious threat to public health. “At a time when health concerns about the safety of cell phones,antennas, and Wi-Fi hotspots are mounting around the globe, “Smart Grids” will require literally billions of new transmitters, each pumping “electrosmog” into the environment- for which there would be no mitigation, no conscientious objection, and no escape.” Read the full article, Dumb and Dangerous “The Problems With Smart Grids” at http://www.counterpunch.org/levitt03182011.html. Please do your homework folks! There are protests all over the nation. Check out these sites: emfsafetynetwork.org, stopsmartmeters.org, turn.org, electricalpollution.com/smartmeters, electromagnetichealth.org, magdahavas.com, bioinitiative.org. Also do not neglect the compilation of 2000 studies and the determinations in the Council of Europe Draft Report: The potential dangers of electromagnetic fields and their effect on the environment http://assembly.coe.int/main.asp?Link=/documents/workingdocs/doc11/edoc12608.htm
Fiber optic is a safe alternative, although I question the need and value of this whole program. Green Upgrader ought to either remove this article and replace it with the true picture, or put an article on the serious public health and safety concerns right beside this and encourage people to educate themselves.
The WHO has just recently acknowledged the relationship between Wi-Fi/cell phones and towers and cancer. The EU is about to ban Wi-Fi in schools. Taiwan took down 1,500 cell phone towers because so many people complained of feeling ill. Germany (one the most truly green countries) has been encouraging it’s citizens, for years, to turn off all WiFi when not in use and to go back to using a landline with a phone with a cord, DSL… hardwired technology. We need to get with the program here is the US! Numerous scientific studies show these effects of too much WiFi: headaches, fatigue, muddled thinking, tinnitus, irregular heartbeats, affects the central nervous system, brain tumors, leukemia/cancer, impairment of cellular communication, increased stress proteins, strand breaks in the DNA and more. DNA studies: “Electromagnetic fields and DNA Damage”, 2009, “EMFs and the Induction of DNA Strand Breaks”, 2009, “Radio Frequency and Extremely Low-frequency Electromagnetic Field Effects on the Blood-Brain Barrier, 2008). Also EMFs and RFs interfere with the natural magnetic fields affecting bees (contributing to colony collapse disorder) and birds and more.” Does this sound like a green program to you? Go to the websites listed here to see what communities are doing to stop this madness, including Not-So-”Smart” Grid bans, and opt-outs being required!

Linda

Smart Meters are neither green nor smart. I have heard from experts in energy conservation report that the carbon footprint may actually be bigger than it is without smartmeters when you figure in storage, etc. Hopefully an anti-smartmeter conservationist will write in with the details.

It’s not green if it’s hurting people. I have received 3 reports that within 2-3 years of having smartmeters in communities (Arizona, New York and Sweden) that many of the old people died and others, even in their late 40s and 50s have suffered massive heart attacks or other serious conditions such as cancer.

Further, the trend overseas is away from wireless and in favor of wired. For example, in Geneva where the World Health Organization is, they have city wide internet that is WIRED. In Paris, libraries removed wi-fi. In Taiwan, 2007, 1500 cell towers were removed. In Germany, the government warned their citizens not to use wi-fi and not to use their mobile phones except in emergencies. Italy and France banned cell phones in schools. Spain removed cell towers. Nearly 40,000 doctors from Austria and Germany signed the Freiburger Appeal that says that they have observed a strong correlation between a dramatic rise in chronic and serious illness they have seen and pulsed high frequency radio waves. This parallels the red flags raised by 1000′s of research studies.

Furthermore, Dan Hirsch, Professor of Nuclear Policy UC-Santa Cruz finds that the radiation from the SmartMeters may be 100 times stronger than cell phones (based on data provided by the California Council on Science and Technology). At the Santa Barbara, California Board of supervisors Meeting July 5th a woman, a building biologist who typically measures wireless emissions, found that they emissions from the smartmeter was off the chart and she had to add additional equipment to get the reading.

Many have gotten sick, very sick. They are getting symptoms described as early as the 1930s – of radio frequency sickness – headaches, fatigue, heart problems, ringing in the ears, insomnia, etc, etc.

43 governments in California are opposing smartmeters due to high cost, fires, health, privacy, etc issues. The wireless smartgrid is criminal with violations of FCC standards, etc. The utilities have been found to be lying on numerous accounts.
RobertWilliams

Smart Meters are NOT Green.

Other than the $$$ that is transferred from customers to utility companies, there is NOTHING green about Wireless smart meters.

1. The utility information generated by Wireless smart meters is NOT real-time and it is NOT formatted for customer use so it does NOT assist customers to use less energy or lower their utility bills. The information only assists the Utility Company to bill customers and shut off customer power remotely.

2. In places where Wireless smart meters have been installed, energy use is NOT decreasing, CUSTOMER UTILITY BILLS HAVE INCREASED, there are problems with SECURITY, HACKING, ELECTRICAL FIRES & ELECTRICAL INTERFERENCE.

3. The Utility companies are salivating over eliminating the jobs of the full-time-with-benefit meter reader employees and replacing them with phone operators in India and the Philippines who read scripts to customers over the phone for $4 per day with-NO-Benefits. And the savings are NOT passed on to customers.

4. Wireless smart meters transmit radiation 360 degrees approximately 23,000 times per day, every day, 24/7, at the rate of about one radiation transmission every four seconds or 15 per minute, NOT for only 45 seconds per day as Utility companies advertise. Radiation transmissions from Wireless smart meters have the strength to travel over a mile, so it is also important to keep them off your neighbor’s homes.

5. Wireless smart meters are NOT mandated by the US Federal Energy Program, as California’s PG$E pretends.

6. 43 Cities & Counties in California have taken positions AGAINST Wireless smart meters and 13 have passed Ordinances prohibiting Wireless meter installation.

ALSO: every appliance has or will have its own electronic signature, so yes, Wireless smart meters will give your exact activity information to the utility company and the government will have access to every move you make in your home. Existing analog meters only provide total usage and therefore protect your privacy.

High-tech home robbers (and High-Tech Child Molesters) will also hack this information and know exactly our habits and when we are not home (and When Our Children Are Home).
Sierra

If you or anyone cares enough to get educated about the issues with smart meters, please read this primer I wrote last fall. It covers most of them in a short space. Beth, while the image and intent of this tech may be green or beneficial at first glance, the many problems caused make them a pretty bad idea. Please do read this.
http://readersupportednews.org/pm-section/78-78/3975-a-qsmartq-meter-primer-should-you-care