Can you or anyone explain the reasons to not have a smart meter?
Well, yes and no.
I can explain why I’m not having one, but I’m not going to suggest that it’ll be reasons others will necessarily find valid. It fits into 3 broad categories :-
- doesn’t give me anything I want, let alone need
- I’m a contrarian git and got very peev ed at their utterly deceitful letters
- privacy
Many, many years before electricity smart meters came along, I had already bought and used ‘meters’ that would give me a decent guide to what devices used how much, and an inductively’coupled meter on the main feed into the house giving m a guide to whole-home usage.
Before anyone jumps in and points that that these aren’t hugely accurate, yeah, I know. But they do give me enough data to know what’s using a trivial amount, and what needs to be looked at. That highlighted a couple of things worth pointing out. Firstly, I had a ‘dimmer’ switch (with 4 60w incandescent bulbs on it) giving me a very strange behaviour. It was actually using more power, and 24/7/365 at that, with the lights off, than when on but at about 15% power. HUH? So, new switch followed.
The other example was an old freezer drinking down power. It turned out a door seal had gone and the compressor was running full-time. A new freezer was about 40% bigger capacity, but used an astonishing 10% of the power.
So, I already have a good grasp of what uses power here, a list of power consumption and both the means and mindset to keep an eye on it.
As for their deceitful letters, getting conned as to whether I MUST have their ne meter or not offends me, and puts my back up. A really, really bad way to get me to accept a smart meter.
Finally, privacy. Tricky one, that. My first point is that I see no point in giving anyone data about me, unless I want to. Every byte that gets out of my control isone byte I’m never giving back. I take the points some have made about smart phones etc, BUT I’m very careful about that, too. I havetaken active measures to make sure the minimum of data gets out, including (but not limited to) only having apps I really need, and having more than one phone, used in different ways. For instance, I very rarely make or receive calls on it, and never at home. My ‘home’ mobil isn’t linked to my home address, and is never used at home. Because I rarely use a mobile on a cellular network, my ‘not-home’ phone is essentially an ‘emergency’ unit, and never turned on while at home. It also isn’t a smart phone. So good luck to anyone tracking whether I’m home or not, ’cos one phone never goes ot, and the ‘out’ phone never gos home …. while powered on. Oh, and i ever use locaton services or any app that does, use a dedicated SatNav not a phone, and am VPN’d thoroughly anyway. And so on.
All these aspects of smart meters suit me, not least because I have a very personalised way of doing things. Are they applicable to anybody else? robably not, but that’s their call, not mine. Either way, my electricity company wound me up with their antics badly enough that, on principle, I@m not having a smart meter here until such time as they can legally force me to.
Lastly, cost. My electricity usage isn’t high, the bill is modest and whether having one saves me a bit, or not having one costs me a bit, I utterly don’t care. If having a smart meter would halve my power bill, my answer would still be “over my dead body”.
