Quote:
Originally Posted by Ryland
Average electric bill in the US is around $100 per month so a $5 increase to pay for a new meter is only a 5% increase and it's much cheaper then paying for a new power plant to be built.
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I must be doing well below the average, then. Even during the hot summer we had last year, I paid at most $80. My average is more like $40. A $5 increase there is somewhat more than 5%, I think.
In any case, how does raising the cost of the electric bill justify installing smart meters? Especially as the consumer would have to pay even more out of their own pocket in order to buy the necessary consumer equipment needed to let the consumer take advantage of the wonders of being able to monitor their own electricity usage?
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ryland
So while you were in Italy you had them shut your power off a lot by mistake?
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I experienced, on average, about one outage every 2 weeks directly due to that damned smart meter feeding my apartment. Amazing experience, that. My neighbors would still have power, yet mine would go out, and repeated calls to their call center would be met with "sorry, but it must be your fault" even after electricians were brought in by my landlord to inspect my apartment for electrical faults.
Of course, being an American living in Italy, I did consume more power than the average Italian, I suppose. I suppose it served me right for insisting that I have an Euro-spec refrigerator to store milk and eggs and bread and things that I had cooked.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ryland
...my parents have solar and wind power and use the grid as back up only, when they first got a smart meter they were using more electricity then they were producing so they were hooked up to the grid using a small amount of grid power...
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...Hold on a second, here...
Let's take that "small amount of grid power," shall we? How much power do you think the smart meter there consumes? 30 W? Seems reasonable, right?
Now, let's multiply that by around 500K homes. Suddenly, that's an extra 15 megawatts that need to be supplied by the electric company.
Of course, the traditional stupid meter may have consumed more
while measuring a running refrigerator AND a running A/C unit AND an operating electric oven AND a running clothes dryer AND an operating water heater, but so what? The traditional stupid meter consumes next to nothing at low loads (like at night). These new-fangled smart meters consume a constant amount of power, even with "sleep mode" or anything else you care to mention. That's more power that has to be generated by the electric company. That's more emissions going into the air.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ryland
When we are better informed we an make better choices and I don't understand the argument for being less informed!
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Let me Google that for you:
Home Electricity Monitors
As you can see, they cost much less than $500, and they allow you to "be informed."