Climate and energy

Location: Kansas Corporation Commission (KCC) building, west Topeka, horribly windy day
Issue: Open KCC meeting on smart metering technologies, presentation by Elster Group
Participants: KCC commissioners (Chairman Thomas Wright, Commissioner Joe Harkins, Commissioner Michael Moffet), KCC staff, various utility representatives, and members of the public (which I think was represented mostly by the Citizens’ Utility Ratepayers Board (CURB) and CEP)

Summary: The KCC often invites outside presenters to discuss energy topics. Today Elster presented on their AMI (Advanced Metering Infrastructure) technology, which the rest of us usually refer to as smart metering.

******************************************

Yep, we’re back. This CEP broadcast wasn’t “live” live, for two major reasons: (1) KCC meetings are usually fairly small, and me typing frantically on a keyboard is not really helpful for the ambiance, (2) I also forgot to get the guest wireless password for the KCC building ahead of time.

As some of you know, the KCC has a major energy efficiency docket coming up on its schedule this summer – they are considering implementing a form of decoupling.

Decoupling is when utilities are allowed to break the link between their profits and their customers’ consumption – in a world where we need to save energy, this rate structure just doesn’t work anymore. Instead, decoupling allows utilities to recover the costs of energy efficiency, conservation, etc. It sets up a rate structure where utilities can make money by helping consumers save energy.

Smart metering is one of many technologies that can help with energy saving programs. Thus your KCC commissioners wanted to learn more about it (So I imagine! I didn’t get a chance to ask.)

Basically, smart meters allow for two-way wireless communication between utilities and customers. This flow of information helps utilities to better manage load and customers to better manage consumption. The result is saving energy, which is good for the environment.

Smart meter technologies are just now starting to be deployed on a large scale in the U.S. One major pilot project now going in is Xcel Energy’s work in Boulder, CO.

Smart meters will someday be a key ingredient of smart grid technology – where energy production and consumption information flowing freely over the entire electric grid, not just within one utility’s service territory. One benefit of smart grids is that they are better able to handle the intermittent power of renewables energies such as wind and solar.

******************************

In terms of engineering, the Elster presentation was way over CEP’s head. Instead, I focused on what consumers might find interesting about smart meters.

First, how do they work? A smart meter is basically a radio frequency based communications unit that is integrated with a normal “dumb” meter (if you will). It replaces the meter that is now on your house.

A smart meter tracks your power usage and sends the information to your utility, so the utility knows when and how to generate power. The smart meter also tracks your utility’s load and pricing information and sends it back to you, so you know when and how you can save money by using less power.

Right now, this sort of real time pricing is only available to large industrial customers. Smart meters help make this option possible for residential and small commercial customers as well.

Smart meters can transfer this information in hourly intervals, or even in close to real time. Some versions can also offer you complete breakdowns of your daily and monthly usage.

Like TVs, smart meters come from basic to fancy, with different options for upgrades. With some smart meters, customers would have the option to sign up for additional monitoring options – for example, you give the utility authority to raise or lower your thermostat by four degrees.

Many of these extra options offer additional benefits for utilities. Smart meters are (I think) an outgrowth of automated meters. Those are already widely used – when the utility truck drives by, they have a scanner that can just read your meter from the road. There’s no need to get out and approach your house.

Smart meters can incorporate a lot of tools to reduce a utility’s overhead. They can connect or disconnect service remotely, report outages automatically and help pinpoint the source of small outages, track load data accurately, detect theft or tampering, and facilitate “reverse energy monitoring.”

(For you net metering supporters, that last means that they can track not only your home energy consumption, but also your production from small wind and solar.)

About here is where the presentations ended, and the commissioners’ questions began. Three sharp guys, who aren’t generally known for making sudden moves. They were very interested in seeing the smart meter system in action. This means they will have to head to Arizona or Ontario, where the largest Elster North American installations are.

Just a summary of what else they came up with:

Q: What does all this cost?
A: The most basic units can run about $145 per customer. That can climb much higher, though, depending on what kind of options the utility wants to include on the meters. It sounded like there were also software package costs on the utility side.

Q: How is it paid for – by installing meters for free, and then socializing costs into the rates?
A: Usually, yes. Commissioner Harkins in particular kept returning to questions of how the finances worked.

A little bit of background – regulatory agencies like the KCC have to have tests in place for how they decide whether your utility can pass costs on to you, the ratepayer.

Basically, before the KCC will go for any bells and whistles (and at this point energy efficiency measures are still somewhat considered bells and whistles), those extras have to meet some very strict tests. Part of the decoupling docket, actually, is to decide exactly what tests will be used. (More on that at a later date.)

CEP was interested in an additional set of questions – while smart meters can empower consumers in many ways, is there a chance that they expose them to other risks?

Q: Do smart meters also incorporate consumer safeguards? The information on the meters gets communicated both ways. However, many consumers worry that they might not have many options for controlling the terms of that exchange.
A: This is where regulatory authority can help (if your utility is regulated by the KCC, that is, and if your utility applies to have the costs of smart metering covered in its rates)

Before allowing smart meters, the KCC has the power to make regulations that ensure your data is kept private (similar to your banking information), mandate a customer-controlled override switch, require the existence of a web portal where you can change your metering preferences, require utilities to offer you economic incentives for signing up for a certain level of monitoring, etc.

Q: Gadgets break. Radio waves can be disrupted (even though it’s not supposed to happen). Frequencies can get crowded. Does a disruption in the communication side of the smart meter lead to a disruption in service?
A: According to Elster, no. When the smart meter goes down, its “dumb meter” side keeps running. Service is not interrupted. All that happens is that the data flow catches up later, when the smart side – the communications side – kicks back on.

If your service is interrupted due to an emergency, like a tornado, then that would happen no matter what kind of meter you had.

Smart meters aren’t yet coming to a utility near you. However, at some point, that could change.

— Maril Hazlett, www.climateandenergy.org