Metering.com - Metering International Edition 1

A rapidly changing world

Tue, 04 Mar 2008 14:38:05 +0100

:NODATE:In today’s world things can change very quickly. This was illustrated very starkly with the recent housing market crisis in the United States, which almost overnight threw many of the world’s economies, particularly those in developing countries, into turmoil.

Not quite so sudden but no less striking has been the intensification over the past year of interest and debate on the environment, which has now reached unprecedented levels. One international meeting follows another and commentary in the press is ongoing, and indeed few of us now remain untouched by the environmental changes that are sweeping the earth, whether it is experiencing above average temperatures, stronger winds or heavier downpours of rain.

Metering International Edition 1, 2008

Tue, 04 Mar 2008 14:28:26 +0100

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Current Affairs

Association News

Earning the loyalty of customers in a complex scenario

Thu, 28 Feb 2008 13:57:08 +0100

:NODATE:By Elena Gonzalez Sanchez

In this scenario, only the large enterprises with technical personnel are able to analyse the best utility offers, while the small/home office (SOHO) and residential customers are not able to do so.

Figure 1 – Electricity liberalisation

Moreover the SOHO and residential customers that decided to go for offers in the early stages of the liberalised market (2003-2004) when the offers were fairly aggressive then faced switching problems and all the inconveniences of a new market. Then a year or so later those customers were strongly advised to return to the regulated market.

Crafting a persuasive smart meter customer experience

Thu, 28 Feb 2008 13:50:34 +0100

:NODATE:By Peter C. Honebein and Roy F. Cammarano

The purpose of this article is to provide ideas for designing smart meter customer experiences that enable customer performance. Customer performance occurs when customers are willing and able to take specific actions that contribute to achieving the demand response and energy efficiency goals that are often part of the smart meter business case.

Standards for metering in India

Thu, 28 Feb 2008 13:39:47 +0100

:NODATE:By Prasanth Gopalakrishnan

This article puts the standardisation process in perspective and discusses the need for an open protocol standard for metering communications in the Indian scenario and the applicability of IEC 62056/DLMS/ COSEM.

INDIA’S METERING SCENARIO
India’s electricity market has the unique problem of a high level of losses, theft and unbilled power at the distribution level. The major contributor to the losses is attributed to theft and there is a particular focus from the government as well as the utilities and manufacturers to address this issue. Thus over the years metering specifications and features have been increasingly adapted towards tamper detection in the meter.

Batteries for smart meters

Thu, 28 Feb 2008 13:36:25 +0100

:NODATE:By Thomas Dittrich

Smart metering systems can reduce energy consumption by up to 15 percent, thus contributing to energy efficiency and climate protection. Batteries are used as the power source for gas, water and heat meters and must last between 10 and 20 years.

BATTERIES FOR METER FUNCTIONS
One typical application is an electronic gas meter using a lithium battery as the power source. The electronics require a mix of low and high currents to power microprocessors, sensors and flow measurement functions, and need a battery capacity of 16.2 Ah over 11.5 years without falling below 3.2 Volts when operating between -20OC and +60OC.

Meter quality from procurement to disposal

Thu, 28 Feb 2008 13:20:43 +0100

:NODATE:By CW Yu

CLP operates a vertically integrated electricity generation, transmission and distribution business in Hong Kong, and provides a highly reliable supply of electricity and excellent customer services to over 2.2 million customers in its supply areas. Based on its utilisation experience in the past decades and studies of global best practices, CLP has identified and adopted a high quality metering solution with the following features:

A utility pioneer - an interview with Debra Reed

Thu, 28 Feb 2008 13:16:56 +0100

:NODATE:By Jonathan Spencer Jones

Debra Reed, president and CEO of San
Diego Gas & Electric (SDG&E) and
Southern California Gas Company (SoCalGas)

These are philosophies that have underpinned the life and career of Debra Reed, president and CEO of San Diego Gas & Electric (SDG&E) and Southern California Gas Company (SoCalGas), the utility subsidiaries of Fortune 500 energy company Sempra Energy.

CIOs prepare for uncharted waters pursuit of intelligence

Thu, 28 Feb 2008 13:10:33 +0100

:NODATE:By Warren Causey

Increasingly, the executive suite is turning to chief information officers to solve many of these problems. Options include substituting technology for people in the field by automating grids; substituting demand response when on a voluntary or even mandatory basis for hard-to-build generation; and substituting technological asset optimisation to obtain the most from existing assets.

Data privacy and security issues for advanced metering systems

Thu, 28 Feb 2008 12:50:56 +0100

:NODATE:By Mark F. Foley

“Privacy” has different meanings in various contexts. The US Supreme Court has issued dozens of decisions recognising a “right to be let alone.” US Common Law prohibits four privacy violations: 1) Intrusion upon seclusion or solitude, or into private affairs; 2) Public disclosure of embarrassing private facts; 3) Publicity placing a person in a false light in the public eye; and 4) Appropriation of name or likeness.1 Recent “privacy” laws, such as the European Union Privacy Directive 95/46/EC, have established a data subject’s right to control the collection, dissemination, and use of personally identifiable information.2

In the AMI context, the “right to privacy” means an individual’s ability to set a boundary between permissible and impermissible uses of information about him- or herself. What is impermissible is a matter of culture as expressed in law, markets, consensus values, and what individuals freely accept without objection.

AMI puts privacy interests at risk because its core purpose is to collect information related to a particular household or business. Meters already available can collect a unique meter identifier, timestamp, usage data, and time synchronisation every 15 to 60 minutes. Soon, meters will also collect outage, voltage, phase, and frequency data, and detailed status and diagnostic information from networked sensors and smart appliances. These data show directly whether people are present, when, and what they are doing. Analysis of this data, as demonstrated by George Hart in an article “Residential energy monitoring and computerised surveillance via utility power flows,” can reveal a surprising amount of additional detail.3 Standard seven-year utility data retention practices enhance the risks by making large amounts of data available.

How much privacy risk AMI creates depends on its design. As discussed by Michael LeMay and colleagues at the University of Illinois in the article “An integrated architecture for demand response communications and control,” AMI can employ various technologies, alone or in combination, such as sensors, wireless transfers, Internet connections, mesh networks, and local and remote appliance and HVAC command and control systems.4

What constitutes permissible uses of personally identifiable information varies from culture to culture and time to time; but what goes on inside a residence is generally an area of special privacy concern.5 Even illicit activity within a home has special legal protection. In the US, for example, law enforcement may not use sense enhancing technology to reveal activity within a home if the technology is capable of revealing both illegal and legal activity and residents would not expect such technology to be used against them.6 Because AMI data reveal more about what goes on inside a residence than would otherwise be known to outsiders, the collection and use of such data reduce the scope of private information. Although “privacy” is generally considered to be a personal right, businesses do typically have analogous common law, statutory, and/or constitutional rights.7

The changing face of meter data management

Thu, 28 Feb 2008 12:37:12 +0100

:NODATE:By Richard Quigley

The MDM system that is now offered by a number of suppliers has metamorphosed from a simple data repository 10 years ago to a highly sophisticated data management system, providing seamless data interaction between key IT systems (near real time responsiveness) and providing a new level of business insight. The principle drivers behind the change in the MDM system are generic in nature but specific in practice: Political, Economical, Sociological, Technical and Legal (PESTL), with the Environmental (PESTLE) driver now a key part of the mix.

The adventures of net metering

Thu, 28 Feb 2008 12:11:02 +0100

:NODATE:By David R. Scott and Stephen C. Hadden

What is net metering and why is it still such a controversial subject? The definition in Wikipedia sums it up nicely: “Net metering is an electricity policy for consumers who own, generally small, renewable energy facilities, such as wind or solar power, or use vehicle-to-grid systems. Net, in this context, is used in the sense of meaning ‘what remains after deductions’ – in this case, the deduction of any energy outflows from metered energy inflows. Under net metering, a system owner receives full retail credit for at least a portion of the electricity they generate. The ideal has the customer electricity meter spinning backwards, effectively banking excess electricity production for future credit.”

Market-based demand response

Thu, 28 Feb 2008 10:01:58 +0100

:NODATE:By Hanne Sæle and Ove S. Grande

After the 2002/03 winter with high prices caused by low precipitation, the Norwegian Ministry of Petroleum and Energy issued a White Paper on the security of supply. Improved end user contracts and efficient use of Automatic Meter Reading (AMR) and remote load control (RLC) were among the various measures to mitigate a tight future energy situation.

Avoiding load shedding by smart metering and pricing

Thu, 28 Feb 2008 09:56:24 +0100

:NODATE:By Robert Earle and Ahmad Faruqui

Several developments have played into this expansion. Growing economies from the oil-rich Middle East to developing economies such as China and India have found themselves faced with soaring electricity demand as a result of their fast paced growth. However, the electric power infrastructure has failed to keep pace with agressive economic growth. As a result, many countries with rapidly developing economies are encountering power shortages and resorting to load shedding.

US Midwest dives into energy efficiency in 2007

Thu, 28 Feb 2008 09:27:16 +0100

:NODATE:By Alicia Ward

The US Midwest

In November, twelve governors and one Canadian premier signed the Energy Security and Climate Stewardship Platform, which commits each state to meeting 2 percent of annual electricity and natural gas consumption through efficiency resources by 2015. The Platform, an initiative of the Midwestern Governors’ Association, will be implemented at the state level.