Is knowledge the key to smart metering?
Ofcom recently released its fifth Communications Market report, containing a wealth of data on the progress of the UK’s telecoms sector. This is one of the more advanced in Europe: consumers can access digital TV via cable, DTTV, satellite and IPTV, and almost a third of households take a triple play service incorporating fixed-line, TV and broadband. The BBC’s iPlayer, having undergone two years of trials, has gone from strength to strength since its launch in December 2007. The player has been incorporated within Virgin Media’s offering, and will soon be launched on the Nintendo Wii, overcoming one of the enduring difficulties of Internet-based applications getting from the PC to the TV.
Although unstated, the report also provides a strong argument for smart metering.
According to the Energy Savings Trust, by 2020 consumer electronics devices will account for 45% of all electricity used in the home, compared to around 30% currently. Much of this is due to changing technology, as well as having more of it. Technology has moved on from the CRT TV and VCR to incorporate large plasma TVs consuming on average over three times as much energy as a CRT. There are also multiple peripheral devices. When analogue switch-over gets into its stride in the next two years, households will be obliged to add a digital set-top box to their list of power-hungry devices. As for more of it, it is common for children to have TVs, DVRs and gaming consoles in their rooms, and since all have mobile phones one can throw in a mobile charger as well.
There are a number of European-based agencies which endeavour to alert consumers to their power usage and to encourage manufacturers to increase energy efficiency and reduce the level of power consumption. Yet getting consumers to change their behaviour is the main difficulty. One tactic is to shock them into turning off appliances rather than putting them on stand-by. This can be done simply by alerting them to how much power is being used. A set-top box on stand-by, for example, will consume about 91% of its ‘on’ power, a DVR will use 51%. Yet only 12% of UK consumers regularly switch off the set-top box, and 23% their DVR.
The use of smart meters is crucial to overcoming consumer ignorance of their power consumption. In February 2008 a trial by Scottish and Southern Energy involving 2,000 residents near Perth (and since repeated by a number of other energy suppliers across the country) illustrated the dramatic change in everyday habits when smart meters presented consumers with a visual display of power use, whether from putting on a kettle or switching off a computer monitor.
The UK, currently debating whether to replace 45 million gas and electricity meters with smart meters or with cheaper and less instructive electricity display units, could learn from experiences in Italy where electricity consumption has fallen 5% since smart meters were introduced in 2005, or Canada where the government of Ontario introduced smart meters as a way to avoid investing in more coal-fired power stations.
This consumer, for one, has already changed his power-use habits, and is proselytizing the virtues of smart metering.
Henry Lancaster - Senior Analyst Europe, BuddeComm
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