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Thread: You just gotta love computers! :(

  1. #16
    Join Date
    Mar 2003
    Location
    Monroe, MI
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    11,896
    Quote Originally Posted by Brian Henderson View Post
    Same here. Mandatory, no warning, didn't ask, just showed up at the door one day, told me they were replacing the meter and disconnected my service, didn't care if I was using it or not, it was just gone for a couple of hours.
    They are taking hours to change out to smart meters? Our utility sent post cards every week for a couple weeks explaining the process and offering scheduled timeslots if desired. When they actually to do it they had a set of jumpers to connect around the meter. They record the reading from the old meter (on one of those worthless computer things us Zeros program) and take a picture of the face, change the meter, scan the barcode on the new meter to activate it and pull the jumpers. The whole process takes maybe 5 minutes.

    I'm not sure if they communicate over the power lines or by a cell modem. Maybe in your area they also had to install powerline communication gear?


  2. #17
    Join Date
    Mar 2003
    Location
    SE PA - Central Bucks County
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    65,675
    Matt, here the meters appear to have short-range transmitters and there are visible receivers on the pole infrastructure are intervals. These have yagi antennas that point back to a centralized collection point it appears.
    --

    The most expensive tool is the one you buy "cheaply" and often...

  3. #18
    Join Date
    Mar 2006
    Location
    SoCal
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    22,492
    Blog Entries
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    And insightful observation. And unfortunate situation to be sure. In actuality though the problem has very little to do with computers and everything to do with the people who are operating them :-)

    Guns aren’t killers and computers aren’t stupid but people can be both :-)
    "A hen is only an egg's way of making another egg".


    – Samuel Butler

  4. #19
    Join Date
    Mar 2003
    Location
    Monroe, MI
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    11,896
    Quote Originally Posted by Jim Becker View Post
    Matt, here the meters appear to have short-range transmitters and there are visible receivers on the pole infrastructure are intervals. These have yagi antennas that point back to a centralized collection point it appears.
    I just looked ours up, appears they have options for 4GLTE and an IPV6 mesh network. Not sure which we have but in a subdivision a mesh network would probably work great.


  5. #20
    Join Date
    Oct 2006
    Location
    Minneapolis, MN
    Posts
    5,427
    Quote Originally Posted by Jim Becker View Post
    Without a smart meter...they have to send a meter reader person to, um...read it. Hence, the charge. They were estimating here for a long time with a periodic true-up after an actual read. That was for both gas and electric. Now, both meters are "smart" and transmit the date automagically...
    I think the $50 monthly fee is both for reading the meter and to discourage customers from opting out. If a lot of people opt out they will probably read the meters each month. I bet they won't read meters monthly if only a few people opt out. I have no intention of opting out. The CO-OP wants people on smart meters for reasons other than eliminating meter reading. Smart meters allow the CO-OP to know who does/does not have power during outages.

    Xcel Energy is the big electricity utility here. They have had radio read meters for probably 25 years now. They are not smart meters.

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