Hidden agenda for smart meters

[vta]

Hidden agenda for smart meters

Battle to curb $154m in losses to marijuana grow ops may ding all of us

By Michael Smyth, The Province

Read more: http://www.theprovince.com/technology/Hidden+agenda+smart+meters/5007800/story.html#ixzz1QRZASjYo


It's amazing how the amount of electricity stolen by marijuana growers in B.C. is increasing faster than a hippie's appetite after a double bong hit.

A new report cited by B.C. Hydro pegs the annual amount of power stolen by marijuana grow ops at an astonishing $109 million.

The report adds some new categories: "illegitimate" power use by marijuana growers who actually pay their bills, and the amount of money B.C. Hydro must spend on upgraded infrastructure to deliver all that power to thousands of grow ops.

Total damage to B.C. Hydro and its customers from marijuana grow ops: $154 million a year, the equivalent of a five-per-cent surcharge on your electricity bill.

B.C. Hydro's answer to the problem: spend $1 billion on smart meters to stop pot-producing power poachers.

It's hard to know where to begin explaining how screwed up and illogical this is.

But first, let's review Hydro's recent history of estimating marijuanarelated power theft.

Grow ops need a lot of electricity to power high-wattage lamps, water pumps, dehumidifiers, security systems and other equipment. Growers often steal electricity, by tampering with Hydro's existing "dumb meters," or diverting power from the main supply line.

In 2004, Hydro estimated marijuana power theft at $12 million a year. Then Hydro rolled out its plan to install smart meters.

Hydro estimated power theft at $30 million last August, then $100 million in the spring, and now $154 million from theft and illegitimate use.

A cynic might suspect Hydro was exaggerating grow-op thefts to gain support for its smart meters from suspicious customers.

After all, the original purpose of smart meters is to jack up your electricity bill through "time of use" billing, where you pay more for consuming power at peak periods, such as around dinner time.

Hydro denies the smart meters will be used for time-of-use billing. Instead, the smart meters will be used for things such as catching all those illegal grow ops, it says.

Really?

If Hydro wanted to catch powerstealing pot growers, it could hire a few dozen retired cops to inspect power lines for signs of tampering or jerry-rigging. That would cost a lot less than $1 billion.

Ironically, many marijuana growers like the idea of smart meters, because it means Hydro won't be sending snoopy meter readers around their houses any more.

"It's actually better to have the smart meter," writes an anonymous poster on rollitup.org, a marijuana chat room.

"The guys that check meters won't have to go in your yard any more, eliminating any chance of seeing or smelling something."

Other large-scale growers are switching to diesel-powered generators to conceal electricity use. Just last week, Mounties busted a huge grow-op near Hope powered by a dozen gas generators.

And do you really think clever growers won't figure out a way to bypass the smart meters, just like they bypass the dumb meters now? Google "hack your smart meter" for the answer.

The bottom line: B.C. Hydro is stoking reefer madness. It loves pushing this stamp-out-grow-ops line because that's its best argument for selling the public on smart meters.

My prediction: Marijuana production in B.C. will continue to soar, while you get gouged on your electricity bill with time-of-use billing.

 

[resinryder]

All the higher wattage electrical usage info at the push of a button. This is better than anything that big brother has come up with lately. Let leo offer a reward for anyone with knowledge of an illegal grow opt and the power companies all of a sudden have a legit source for a second income. If you think power companies won't know who and where their higher than normal residential consumer are you've got another think coming.

 

[Max Headroom]

AFAIK these meters will work with wireless cell phone technology.
whenever they show up in my neck of the woods i will vehemently oppose them on the grounds that i have zero interest in having another cancer and brain tumor causing radiation gadget in my living quarters.
fuck them.
cellphones are the asbestos of tomorrow.

 

[Zen Master]

and then when they say 'well go find another power co' if you refuse smart meter installation than what do ya do? go buy a few hundred thousand worth of solar panels?


its all for data mining and 'other than advertised' uses, duh. Ironically my bill has gone up, significantly, since I got a smart meter installed.

 

[Donald Trump]

interesting article..... and damn that is the 2nd time I've seen rollitup mentioned in different news articles lately.

I think the smart meters are more about preventing electric theft than anything (marijuana related)... sure we worry about the light schedules but I have yet to see an article on that. Seems like it's mainly for detecting/preventing electric theft.

 

[gaiusmarius]

you might be right DT, but maybe they are just waiting till they have those smart meters installed everywhere, before they start abusing them?

 

[Donald Trump]

it's possible.

do you guys think it would be beneficial to use the time of day service?

Smart meters provide customers with greater control over their electricity use when coupled with time-based rates, increasing the range of different pricing plans available to customers and giving them more choice in managing their electricity consumption and bills.

Smart Meters enable a utility to measure a customer’s electricity usage in hourly increments.
If a customer elects to participate in time-based rates offered by the utility, they have the opportunity to lower their electricity demand during “peak” periods (the peak period for most utilities are summer afternoons) and potentially save money on their monthly electric bill.

 

[supermanlives]

in my area its manditory to let them install new meters. i dont really care and wont miss they guy coming in my backyard

 

[Donald Trump]

yeah it will be mandatory for everyone

 

[SMOKE-ONE]

I really dont think its any reason to panic.Just run 2 rooms on a flip.

 

[seeyouaunty]

I really dont think its any reason to panic.Just run 2 rooms on a flip.

If you want to be sure to fool a smartmeter you'll need to run your gear off a large online UPS. A flip/flop won't hide the distinctive inductive signature of a ballast from a smart meter if thats what the powerco are looking for.

 

[joeuser]

it's possible.

do you guys think it would be beneficial to use the time of day service?

Smart meters provide customers with greater control over their electricity use when coupled with time-based rates, increasing the range of different pricing plans available to customers and giving them more choice in managing their electricity consumption and bills.

Smart Meters enable a utility to measure a customer’s electricity usage in hourly increments.
If a customer elects to participate in time-based rates offered by the utility, they have the opportunity to lower their electricity demand during “peak” periods (the peak period for most utilities are summer afternoons) and potentially save money on their monthly electric bill.

Yup...it's so they can get people to use energy at night and even things out a bit. The grid is getting tapped out during the day. If they can get you to do more things at night, and save money by doing it then, they don't have to build another power plant.

If you want to be sure to fool a smartmeter you'll need to run your gear off a large online UPS. A flip/flop won't hide the distinctive inductive signature of a ballast from a smart meter if thats what the powerco are looking for.

I doubt they're designed to look for "signatures" and I'm sure there are a LOT of things that have the same signature...after all, it's just a transformer...all electronics have one already.

I think they measure total hourly maybe even by the minute load...and IF any "smart" appliances are hooked up...it will talk to them. I think they want to eventually be able to shut down individual houses appliances when THEY feel the need. To make their limited power stretch farther. For example...odd and even air conditioning. On a hot summer day, when loads are getting critical, they can start shutting off AC units leaving the power on in the rest of the house. Shut off all the even addresses and then the odd in a zip code for an hour each would help immensely! And people would hardly notice.

 

[Zen Master]

lol, the smart meter reads your total power draw, not how much each outlet is pulling.

 

[DARKSIDER]

lol, the smart meter reads your total power draw, not how much each outlet is pulling.

spoken like a wise man

 

[pine boy]

Doesn't digital equipment have a foot print? or am I thinking of the future?
I'm pretty sure it's known what you have.

 

[Scottish Research]

Oh it's more convenient for them sure, and they can say that it was done in an effort to be more ecologically responsible (green) by eliminating the need to send meter readers, but the bottom line is that business only does things to make more money; if the power meter did not promise to increase their gross profit margin it would not have been implemented.

So they play the green angle, but it always is just about the profit.

Let's just hope that this does not make our activities unsafe. If this starts to be a real issue, then we will have to find a way to overcome it like we always do.

I don't have one of these yet. The county was talking about it.

I hope that all of you dealing with this right now stay safe and free.

R.Fortune

 

[seeyouaunty]

I doubt they're designed to look for "signatures" and I'm sure there are a LOT of things that have the same signature...after all, it's just a transformer...all electronics have one already.

I've worked with many smartmeters here downunder and they have a wide range of measurements available: instantaneous and cumulative values of voltage, current, powerfactor, capacitance, inductance, frequency, VA, VAr, etc. If you've got access to a smartmeter you can usually access all these measurements right on the display screen, ive used them onsite to diagnose electrical problems as they've got measuring tools comparable to my $1200 industrial electrical meter(!)

I doubt that they would be used for tracking down growers, but it isn't impossible thats for sure. Smartmeters here have cellphone transmitters to call home, so its the remote logging ability that i'd be most worried about. Imagine a group of central computers logging all the individual smartmeter readings listed above. If someone is looking closely it would be difficult to hide a grow IMO. Just have to hope the powerco's don't have enough motivation to do so.

The electrical signature of a ballast bigger than 250W starting up would be fairly distinctive from anything else in a house.
To give you an idea of how much information can be retrieved from electrical signatures its even possible to know exactly what keyboard strokes are being pushed on a PC if you can access the residences main earth cable. Each individual keystroke has an identifiable voltage signature that (often) leaks onto the earth cable. Gotta love the 21st century.

 

[joeuser]

I've worked with many smartmeters here downunder and they have a wide range of measurements available: instantaneous and cumulative values of voltage, current, powerfactor, capacitance, inductance, frequency, VA, VAr, etc. If you've got access to a smartmeter you can usually access all these measurements right on the display screen, ive used them onsite to diagnose electrical problems as they've got measuring tools comparable to my $1200 industrial electrical meter(!)

I doubt that they would be used for tracking down growers, but it isn't impossible thats for sure. Smartmeters here have cellphone transmitters to call home, so its the remote logging ability that i'd be most worried about. Imagine a group of central computers logging all the individual smartmeter readings listed above. If someone is looking closely it would be difficult to hide a grow IMO. Just have to hope the powerco's don't have enough motivation to do so.

The electrical signature of a ballast bigger than 250W starting up would be fairly distinctive from anything else in a house.
To give you an idea of how much information can be retrieved from electrical signatures its even possible to know exactly what keyboard strokes are being pushed on a PC if you can access the residences main earth cable. Each individual keystroke has an identifiable voltage signature that (often) leaks onto the earth cable. Gotta love the 21st century.

I've been led to believe that typing creates a radio frequency that can be picked up by a receiver. I've NEVER heard of it being picked up in the mains cable to the street. How does it get past the transformer in the power supply? There is NO direct connection between the computer and the mains power in the house...there is a transformer that effectively isolates the DC in the computer from the AC in the wall.

Please explain how this happens. It sounds like propaganda to me...but I could be wrong.

 

[seeyouaunty]

I've been led to believe that typing creates a radio frequency that can be picked up by a receiver. I've NEVER heard of it being picked up in the mains cable to the street.

Not the supply cable, the earth cable. Might be called ground in the USA not sure.

How does it get past the transformer in the power supply? There is NO direct connection between the computer and the mains power in the house...there is a transformer that effectively isolates the DC in the computer from the AC in the wall.

The earth (ground) doesn't go through the transformer. The data wires in a keyboard are poorly shielded so the high frequency keystroke signal can leak (induct) onto the earth wire in the keyboard cable. Add a meter somewhere along the earth cable and bingo.

 

[badmf]

First off remember the power companies are in "business" not a charity. So as long as bills get paid on time they are happy! The "smart" meters are to catch juice jumpers or thieves which get "free" power. You could run 30 lights (safety and fire considerations!) and they will gladly cash your check! With LEDs getting better and cheaper they will lower your bill significantsly as A/C is lower and total juice too!