Smart Meters

With 120,000 smart meters installed across the city, Glendale is ready to get to the next step: building one Web portal where customers can check their utility consumption in order to modify their use and save money. The City Council approved paying CherryRoad Technologies $187,880 to implement the portal technology, which officials say will help the smart meters live up to their potential. Smart meters allow customers to track their energy use and change their behavior in order to save money.

Merry Christmas to Mike Mohill. My Christmas wish for him is to learn to love smart meters (“Privacy, security are the real worries,” Dec. 15). Unfortunately, the absurd rant against smart meters goes on and on. If Mohill only uses a corded phone, writes his letters with pen and paper and never has any sort of diagnostic X-rays, then maybe he has a slight rationale for objecting to the minuscule radiation from smart meters. As far as Big Brother is concerned, Glendale Water & Power already knows how much water and electricity its customers use every two months.

Smart meters aren't worth the $50 million cost to Glendale after the $20-million federal stimulus grant - they may pose health risks, their transmissions pose security and privacy risks and their rollout is premature. A total of 43 city and county governments in California have reportedly taken action to oppose smart meters, and communities in other states have opposed them as well. While the smart grid is something we need to build, smart meters are an exercise in micromanagement.

Utilities are installing smart meters and moving toward a smarter grid. Modernizing our electrical and water infrastructure by integrating new technologies helps bring our system into the 21st century in order for us to meet future needs of our community in a safe, reliable and environmentally responsible way. Knowing the facts is vital to understanding the issues and benefits. The best way to understand how the smart grid helps you is to ask some basic questions: 1. How high is my water and electric usage and how much will my next bill be?

Regarding the Glendale News-Press Nov. 19 editorial titled, “The smart move is to choose a new battle,” I ask, why hasn't there been an open and televised debate on the merits of the smart meters? The News-Press editorial dismissed the concern on privacy and security, but only focused on the health issues, equating anti-smart-meter activists with people who claim certain vaccines cause autism in children. “Decades later,” the editorial states, “misinformation continues to be spread; nothing has changed.” What do vaccines and autism have to do with smart meters?

Perhaps it was inevitable that smart meter naysayers would be unhappy with whatever “opt-out” process Glendale officials set up, but considering that as of a few months ago opting out wasn't even an option, it's hard to see what more controversy could possibly be left. Yes, those who don't want their utility smart meters to transmit data will have to pay for the cost incurred by Glendale Water & Power to send a worker out to manually log the information. But it's still a compromise with utility officials, who have pressed hard against any exceptions to the smart grid.

Do we really need to spend $60 million on smart meters to tell us what most of us already know (Smart meters don't count as 'renewable', Oct. 2)? Or do we need to spend that much money to inform people that it is better to use electric appliances in off peak hours, such as in the evening or at night? The utility has been telling us that for years. Seems like a waste of money to me. Proponents contend that a smarter grid allows customers to take better advantage of renewable energy, and thus take part in “a cleaner, more efficient and more reliable future.” What does that mean?

Glendale Water & Power has reached the halfway mark of installing high-tech smart meters — which officials say puts the utility on track to be the first in the nation to have a fully operational “smart grid” system. Full-scale installation of the 120,000 electric and water meters, which will allow two-way communication with the utility and let customers track real-time water and electric usage, began in December and is expected to be completed by summer. “We are 50% of the way to a smart-grid system foundation that will provide many benefits to our customers and our utility,” General Manager Glenn Steiger said in a statement.

As Glendale and Burbank wait for a state commission to weigh in on whether individual customers can opt out of installation of smart meters, the number of those who want to do so has grown in Burbank. The number of residents who have asked to not have a new smart meter installed in their home has doubled to 117 since the first so-called “opt out” list was compiled in September. Burbank officials say honoring the request could have financial implications for customers. Burbank Water and Power began installing the smart meters - which provide real-time digital information on energy consumption, and which automatically communicate directly with the utility that owns them - in June.

Regarding the proposed water rate increase, yes, Glendale Water & Power will have to raise rates because the cost of water from our supplier is going up and water resources are going down. What Glendale Water & Power should not have done is spend our revenues on so-called smart meters. Somehow this has to be paid, and it will come from our rates. We will always be obligated to our water supply source, the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California. However, we can control our own capital costs, and the smart water meters were a bad decision during this poor economy.

Thirty-plus years ago, city dump trucks were going to use East Glenoaks Boulevard as the main road to the Scholl Canyon Landfill. Neighbors protested, organized and convinced our city council to use Figueroa Street instead. Glenoaks Canyon Homeowners Association was started. Approximately five years ago, my wife and I went up and down Glenoaks and surrounding streets requesting neighbors to come before the city council or sign a petition asking when can East Glenoaks Boulevard potholes be repaired and possibly the whole street repaired.

A delegation from a Chinese utility that serves more than 230 million customers visited Glendale on Tuesday to learn more about the city's smart grid. Representatives for the China Southern Power Grid Co. were particularly interested in learning how Glendale Water & Power simultaneously installed electric and water smart meters, which provide consumption data in near real-time to the customer and utility. Glendale Water & Power General Manager described the visit in a statement released Tuesday as "quite an honor," especially given the size of the Chinese utility, which operates power networks in Guangdong, Guangxi, Yunnan, Guizhou and Hainan province, according to the city.

Now that the water rates have been resolved, rate payers can get ready for a redesign of our electricity rates. The whole purpose of installing smart meters was to be able to implement time-of-use rates. With the installation already in place, Glendale Water & Power can monitor rate payers' usage and at what time of the day their usage occurs. With this information, they will be able to redesign our new rates. No, it won't be a rate increase, just a new, redesigned one that will cause your bill to go up if you don't understand or monitor how you consume energy.

A Facebook application that allows smart meter customers to gauge how much energy their using compared to others went live today, Glendale officials announced. Starting today, Glendale Water & Power customers can connect their utility accounts to the "Opower" app via Facebook and see how they stack up to others in terms of energy consumption. Officials have described the app as sort of a " Farmville " type social networking experience. The app plays into what city officials have said is a key element of the smart meters -- the ability of customers to track their consumption in near real-time to better control costs.

A Facebook application that allows smart meter customers to gauge how much energy they're using compared to others went live Tuesday, Glendale officials announced. Glendale Water & Power customers can connect their utility accounts to the “Opower” app via Facebook to monitor how they stack up to others in terms of energy consumption. Officials have described the app as sort of a “Farmville” type social networking experience. The app plays into what city officials have said is a key element of the smart meters - the ability of customers to track their consumption in near real-time to better control costs.

Re: Glendale's water rate increases: The whole tier rate structuring was all about confusing the people and sliding through the back door another tax to the rate payers by paying more money for their utilities. Monthly billing is a sneaky way to make the utility bill appear less expensive, but at the end of the year, our utility bills will be more costly, even with smart meters. Mike Mohill Glendale

Burbank Water and Power customers who want to opt out of having a digital meter measure their residential power usage have two months to inform the utility, according to a new policy approved by the City Council. Despite some confusion among opponents, Joanne Fletcher, assistant general manager for customer service and marketing at the utility, said in an email that the opt-out policy will be open to all customers. About 90 customers, most of them homeowners, have said they do not want the new meter, citing health and privacy concerns, among others.

Perhaps it was inevitable that smart meter naysayers would be unhappy with whatever “opt-out” process Glendale officials set up, but considering that as of a few months ago opting out wasn't even an option, it's hard to see what more controversy could possibly be left. Yes, those who don't want their utility smart meters to transmit data will have to pay for the cost incurred by Glendale Water & Power to send a worker out to manually log the information. But it's still a compromise with utility officials, who have pressed hard against any exceptions to the smart grid.

Glendale residents who want to opt out of the city's $70-million smart meter program now have the option to do so, but it will come with a price. Under a new program approved by the City Council on Tuesday, the nearly 150 residents who have expressed interest in opting out, or .015% of Glendale Water & Power customers, will have to pay between $35 and $56 a month to stop the new digital meters from emitting signals, which opponents claim make them...

Glendale residents may soon be getting another technology device for their electricity-tracking arsenal. In addition to the near-real time reports customers will be able to access online - thanks to smart meters and print-outs mailed to residents comparing their electricity use to similar customers - Glendale Water & Power is also gearing up to offer an app-friendly way to communicate data. Glendale Water & Power is one of a handful of utilities to offer the “Green Button” technology, endorsed by the Obama administration.