Thursday, December 2, 2010

An advanced meter

A reader asked us at the Power Panda this week about why our previous post didn't mention smart meters at all.

The simple reason is as follows:
A 'smart meter' is not a different type of meter, it is a different way of reading a meter.

To explain further, a smart meter allows the electricity company to read your meter remotely, and to turn your meter on and off remotely.  That is all the difference.

You still have an anytime configuration, night only configurations, controlled configurations, etc.  You will still have a meter type.  However with an advanced meter your meter is read remotely.

(The meter has access to the vodaphone network.  What happens is that the power company sends a text to the meter telling it to read itself, and the meter sends a response back by text).

That is all that is advanced about an advanced meter (actually that's not quite true, the power company can turn it on and off remotely via text also, but those two are the only differences).  Your advanced meter does not save you money, and it is really only for the benefit of the Power Company.

It's not a different meter type, just a different way of reading the meters.

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