Is My Smart Meter Going To Kill Me Part 1?

Dear Pablo: I have been hearing a lot of controversy around smart meters. Are the additional radio waves emitted by them a danger to my family?

A "smart meter" is an electric or gas meter that electronically transmits meter readings to the utility. Smart meters are only a small component often touted, but rarely understood "Smart Grid." Recently smart meters have been getting a lot more attention, primarily due to a small, yet vocal group of concerned Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E) customers protesting against their installation. http://www.treehugger.com/files/2010/09/ask-pablo-is-my-smart-meter-going-to-kill-me.php?campaign=daily_nl

Why Are Smart Meters Good?
Smart meters will allow utilities and customers to reduce energy use and save money. Customers will save money by being able to track their electricity usage in near-real time and then making lifestyle choices and appliance-buying decisions to lower their monthly utility bill. Customers will also be able to switch to a time-of-use (TOU) rate structure that allows them to take advantage of very low rates during non-peak hours by choosing to run appliances like washers and dryers at night, rather than during peak demand periods. New appliances and thermostats will interface with the new smart meters to run during non-peak hours or to reduce their usage during peak hours.
Shifting electricity usage to off-peak hours will also help reduce the utility's peak demand, reducing the number of new power plants that they have to build. Imagine the hottest day of the year. Every AC unit in the state is turned to 11 and the grid is straining under the demand.

Now imagine a normal day, when statewide electricity demand is at about 80% of that hot day. This demand is met mostly with hydroelectric, nuclear and very large power plants that do not like to be turned up and down too much; they provide the base load and they do so at about 33% efficiency. On the hottest day, when the grid is at 100% that electricity has to come from somewhere. Power plants have to be built and sit idle most of the year, just waiting for that hot day. These plants, called "peakers" can be ramped up and down quickly to keep up with demand but are far less efficient. So reducing the peak demand of the year actually results in not needing to build extra power plants.

Did you know that some utilities have to rely on customers calling to report an outage, and then drive around to determine the location of an interruption? Not so with smart meters. Smart meters will report outages automatically and allow utilities to pinpoint a problem to within the distance between two homes. Finally, smart meters eliminate the need for someone to drive to your neighborhood once a month an creep around your house to manually read you meter, although I do hope that the utilities have new jobs for these people.

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