US utilities plot remote switch off
HomePlug, the networking standard for sending data over mains wires, is to implement ZigBee's Smart Energy protocol, allowing utilities to reach out and the thermostat turn down, or up, when power is short. An array of US utility companies is pushing the initiative, which sees HomePlug extending ZigBee Smart Energy to work over …
You mean the crazy power company that sends me fecked up bills every two months can now determine what I should be running in my own home? That seems to be what they're saying but that's crap. I'll never let them take me (or my pool pump) alive.
On another slightly different note - did you all realize that by getting rid of computers and data centers there really wouldn't be a power supply issue to be fixing.
Supply outstrips demand, and instead of expanding, they start throttling, it's cheaper.
Where have I heard this before?
Paris, because I wouldn't throttle her
Will they perhaps be employing Yoda to use 'the force'?
"Reach out and the thermostat turn down, or up, when power is short" you will?
power not to the people then?
mines the one with the 13amp plugs in
If I were a utility and was a bit short on the quarterly revenue forecast there would be a temptation to turn all the kettles on for a bit of additional cash.
If they come to the Canadian Praries for a winter & they'll find out what critical is.
The coat, because you're going to need it!
I'd be more worried about them turning things on to push up the bills. They wouldn't have to do it obviously - they could just get your thermostat to wait an extra five minutes before turning off.
Presumably this will be an "opt-in" scheme with incentives? A percentage off your bill?
Toronto Hydro already have a system to take over your central AC. All you get is a one time $50 credit.
http://www.torontohydro.com/electricsystem/powerwise/peaksaver/index.cfm
If they can turn stuff off, they can turn it on? And then send a bill the size of a telephone directory through your door?
Who defines these "non-critical devices"? Utilities, I thought they LIKED selling electricity to us, seems they now want to control and limit it? Very odd state of affairs these days.
Real Time Live Market Price data digitally encoded on the mains supply, set each device with priceing priority.
Problem one, new meters for everyone.
Problem two, when the price drops everyones water heaters kick in, so immediatly driving the price back up.
Problem three, your weater temperature becomes proportional to the price of supply.
I can just see how this will play out... utilities push this remote management tech, consumers get pissed, smartypants electronics dudes develop a little box that sits on the main incomer cable to the distribution board and low-pass filters out anything but 50/60Hz line voltage, cost a few bucks.
Bye-bye remote device management via powerline - unless utilities can get consumer buy-in by demonstrating cost savings/user benefit -- AND that they won't f*** it up. And since they often can't even reliably get basic billing right ...
Hell -- will they have to encrypt the signalling on the remote powerline to stop local hackers/crims from monkeying with the neighbourhood's devices for kicks?
~R
do they consider to be non critical? Probably not the same as me, or anyone else.
In some countries (that don't use a/c's as excessively as most of the US does) this has been common practice for decades. For example, disabling washing machines and driers during cooking and lunch time. Usually, electrical power is also cheaper in those areas because they can control their peak usage and don't have to buy from other producers.
where the sun shineth not!
I'LL decide how warm / cool I want my house. NO-ONE else.
When I say "I", I do, of course, mean She Who Must Be Obeyed. (No, not you, Sarah Bee!)
Thumb/under!
I can just picture the missus jumping to the kettle in the ad break for corrie...a few seconds too late and the power would've spiked. No brew for you.
She'd think she had worn out another kettle.
Swan and Tefal will be in on the act too.... 12months and 3 days since first switch on...pzzzzt
it's a conspiracy I tell thee, a conspiracy! :)
until they turn off the heart-lung machine by mistake!
Before you guys carry on to defend your god-given right to burn fossil fuels, carry sticks that go boom and wank the wiener, may I remind you of cute little Knut [rbb-online.de/knut]. He and his relatives are unhappy about the melting glaciers / polar ice sheets and would be very obliged if you could reduce your greenhouse gas emissions by a bit.
One possibility is to turn off the fridge for those pesky 5 minutes of high demand when the lights go on at 7 am. Else the utilities have to stay prepared for the quick little power surges and produce some 20% of energy for the ashtray. Save some 20% energy with virtually no cost by turning of Some Stuff That Takes Time Anyways (tm) in the right moment sounds like an excellent idea to me.
Maybe the electricity prices might even fall if the utilities save some powerplants. Sign me up, Scotty. And burn, burn, burn all those egoistic prats in the eternal fire of their coal fired power plants!
Nobody of any intelligence will accept this by their own choice, but try to force it on people and watch the backlash. Meters can be bypassed by someone suitably motivated who knows what they're doing - "you tamper with my gear, I'll tamper with yours, bitch" could apply here. Not condoning anything, just saying that you can only push so hard before some people start pushing back.
"will they have to encrypt the signalling on the remote powerline to stop local hackers/crims from monkeying with the neighbourhood's devices for kicks?"
They should, but what's the betting they don't bother or do it half-assed, then make legal threats against anyone who discovers a flaw and tries to disclose it.
"Utilities, I thought they LIKED selling electricity to us, seems they now want to control and limit it?"
They've not been investing enough of the profits they make into keeping the infrastructure up-to-date with demand. Now they're at a point where some areas suffer rolling blackouts and brownouts (some parts of California for example) because they can't supply enough power to meet demand at times. God forbid they spend some of their profits on improving capacity and educating consumers about being more energy-smart, because then they'd have to answer to their shareholders.
Not..... this has far to much potential for problems.
Imagine power companies making deals with kettle manufacture's to ensure their product gets better usage of the power.
Imagine if the system is compromised or breaks down, leaving god knows how many people without heating or hot water.
How about the elderly in wintertime, how is this likely to affect them?
Energy saving appliances that can be easily switched off or have a manual low power mode would be preferable. This way people have a choice as to what they have.
I can see it now...working from home....utility decides I don't need my computer or network stuff to be powered up....kerzzzaapp
There's a similar scheme in the pipeline which doesn't involve the PoCo controlling your devices. It's called Dynamic Demand and basically looks at the frequency of the grid. When it goes up, devices kick in. When it goes down, devices cut out. It's designed for things like fridges and freezer pumps which don't need to be running 100% of the time.
Would be better than working with someone else saying what you can and can't have on at any time.
Gates...'cos how many macs would be able to turn on if Microsoft wrote the control software!
But mainly because ZigBee is one of the most stupid names I've heard in a long time.
My parents are on a plan where the power company can turn off the hot water heater during peak usage, and they get a small credit whenever they do.
Now if they can just get in my house and hook that up I'll believe it.
... they've been doing this here in South Africa for ages, known as ripple control. The only thing they control is the geyser, though, and I don't think it's through anything nearly as cool and high tech as this.
We've already reduced our "greenhouse" emissions by more than Europe, just by voluntary effort, nothing forced upon us by the gubmint. Just leave us alone, and we really do (mostly) take care of things. However, if they start turning off my water heater, I'm going to turn it back up to 190, so it'll still be hot when I want hot water. Will that save energy, or waste it? Law of Unintended Consequences.
the electric companies want to murder senior citizens, do they? I mean, if there's a power crisis in the middle of winter, and they need to turn down everyone's thermostats, well, if a few senior citizens get sick and die, well, who cares?
Please, people. I pay for power. What I do with it is my damn business. If I want to sit in a hot shower for over an hour, then dammit, I will. Screw anyone who says otherwise.
I do have a solution to this. Gasoline electric generators. Go off the network, increase global warming, and get these assholes out of our business. Maybe then they'll keep their noses where they belong.
The local energy racket in Wisconsin has a program in place already that you agree to let them cycle your AC during peak demand and they'll give you a bill credit. The credit is based on how much down-time you agree to and they give it to you regardless of it they actually turn off your AC.
http://www.we-energies.com/residential/acctoptions/epartners.htm
The offer seems pretty reasonable but I'm one of those types that wants it cold on-demand so I probably wouldn't sign up for it. Allowing them to control my heating and water heater is definitely not something I'd go for though.
Looks like you have not read this: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/08/15/goddard_arctic_ice_mystery/
Seems like that ice is not going away as fast as Knut thought it was...
Naturally it will work both ways - every devices logs its turn on/off times along with its unique device ID back out along the mains wires, for the CIA / MI5 / council snoops to collect.
Why would you want to sit in a shower for an hour? "Because I can" is no answer because I can kick the shit out of you. Unfortunately, this is considered antisocial and so I'm told I can't beat the shit out of people just because I'm bigger than them and a lot more nasty.
The only reason I like this idea is so that after the Great Zombie Infestation™, I can do some hacking, turn off all the accidentlaly left on lights and cookers etc. and save juice and stop brown/blackouts while the solitary power stations that are still manned/autonomous are struggling.
""Utilities, I thought they LIKED selling electricity to us, seems they now want to control and limit it?""
Yes, it's weird. I work with a guy whose last job was working for a power utility giving out low-voltage light bulbs, doing energy audits, and trying to persuade people to use less juice.
Flames, because we're doomed to be sitting around campfires within six months if the inept British utilities jump in on this.
They don't charge me a penny for electricity
SchuItz: looked at Knut's website: I can't read it. It's all misspelled and I can't work out the code to decipher it. Regardless, if Knut wants to chip in on my utility bill he's more than welcome to comment on my power usage. Show me the money Knut - otherwise piss off.
Mark: I'm certain that your comment must have been a joke - either that or you a morbidly obese balding white man who regularly threatens people on the Internet. Spouting off about how "big and nasty" you are is gay - so you must be a big nasty morbidly obese balding white homo. I bet Knut could kick your ass.
Ooh, Knut read the article, complete with footnotes and corrections. Looks like the science is challenging, the ice is still melting, and Mr Godart is apologizing to the powers that know better. But thanks for the pointer, makes for interesting reading.
And to reply AC: Good for you if you managed to reduce your personal greenhouse gas emissions. The rest of the island surely didn't, but merely exported their emissions to China by buying foreign industrial products. Industrialized country --> servant's country; go GB, Go.
Just like the ISPs, they want you for a customer, but penalize you if you actually use it.
And the "Turning On Option" is scarier to me...
'cause they will run it when you are'nt there, just to run up the bill,
and when you return home (did they install an Occupancy Sensor?),
they go into conserve mode, and penalize you for minuscule increments of usage.
That is why I unplug "All Items Not In Use", and
That's why I keep the Ferrari up on blocks!
Yeah, that would be about the only reason to allow this.
Call me paranoid, but if you give a company the ability to control things in your house, they'll eventually find a way to make you pay MORE and not less. There is no such thing as a free lunch in this world, and the idea that a company will be altruistic in helping the environment is a load of BS.
I will not buy any device, nor live in any home or area which requires this. If it means I have to build a log cabin in the woods on my own, then so be it.
...wankers...
That'd be "demand outstrips supply", not the other way around.
If supply outstrips demand, then there is energy surplus.
When demand outstrips supply, the need arises to either increase supply (expand) or decrease demand (throttle).
If you're going to try to sound smart, at least put some effort in...
Well just goes to show how badly you can guess when you've got nothing but "what sounds right" to go on, doesn't it.
Almost entirely incorrect, and the one that was (middle age) is only right because, by definition, it covers pretty much half of the human lifespan, half of the remainder being far too young or far too old, so not all that accurate a forecast.
You even managed to get the reason wrong by that classic fallacy "the excluded middle".
It was a demonstration of how letting an individual "do what it likes and can get away with" is wrong for a social species such as mankind (or maybe that should be personkind as far as PCness is concerned).
But you excluded that as a possibility because you wanted me inferred to be either fat and all mouth and no trousers or to be gay.
The latter of which I find strange: most gay men take good care of their bodies.
Well, if there is a serious shortage of energy, not allowing people to use air conditioners or washing machines and so on at certain times would be reasonable. But there's no need to have such a shortage, and resort to such measures; just build more nuclear power plants. As eventually the voters will realize, but then that's perhaps the point of scaring people with such proposals.
I thought the California brownouts were more about companies like Enron (RIP) trying to "game" the pricing system post-privatisation, rather than any real excess of demand over supply? That may have changed recently though.
Only when they prise the BS 1363 from my cold, dead hand.
I like the sound of getting a credit whenever they disable my electricity-burning devices. I like it so much that I would fit another few dozen heater elements to my immersion heater, in fact, for a regular fee, i can supply them with many kilowatts of disabled usage. What the heck, I am saving the planet too, I am sure i can get my hands on a disabled pottery kiln that i can be paid to not use.
Build more nuclear energy.
Paris because its so blatantly obvious, even she could see it.
It's funny that nobody has mentioned one positive aspect to this: it's friendliness towards renewable energy.
It's said that the main challenge facing renewable energy generation is that renewable sources are not generally very responsive, hence the need to keep the coal-burners on the grid to handle the spikes.
This mechanism reduces the severity of the problem for renewables.
That said, ZM hit the mark with the observation that the more a company can do, the more ways they'll find to take money away from you.
Tux, because the "Paris, because" meme is too pervasive.
More and more people are using energy saving devices (bulbs and what not) to "save the planet", therefore using less energy. Meanwhile energy prices continually rise...
Odd that.
//Coat because it might be needed!
My PoCo offers a "lifeline" discount for low- income folks (I believe it's $8.00 USD a month -- no great shakes, but every little helps). Suppose my PoCo enables such a remote- control system. During the summer, everyone is running air conditioning full blast. Does the PoCo decide to route power away from subsidized customers and to those paying the full fare? Do the county- and state- run nursing homes lose a bit of juice so the private resort- like (and priced) complexes can keep their golf carts charged and their jacuzzis running?
While there is definitely room for improvement in the conservation arena, there needs to be more education and incentive for customers to play ball; otherwise, as others have pointed out, people might react negatively to having the choices made for them.
Sign up, sign up for The Register's weekly mobile & wireless newsletter - click here
