---

Smart Meters

Offering customers clarity through simple and digestible information changes the game in everyone’s favor. New products and services evolve from new customer-centric relationships.

Get smart

Smart meters for household energy use make smart consumers. Providing real time information about energy use in the home gives the user an opportunity to make an informed choice. Consider this: paying your monthly energy bill is the same as shopping in a supermarket with no price tags. If you were only told the total price for your groceries at the checkout, you would not be able to make your selection based on individual prices. Now imagine the potential change in your energy consumption if you were aware of the individual costs of everything in your house. A 2008 New York Times article reported on a trial in Hove in England, where resident Brenda Marchant agreed that having a smart meter made a difference to her family’s consumption; “It helps you change your habits.”

The British Government recently announced it would mandate the installation of smart meters in all homes and expected the process to be complete by 2020. France has already begun the process of replacing every domestic meter with smart meters. Ontario expects to have smart meters in every home by 2010. 
The simple process of making information available affects behavior and makes, in this case, new products and services more likely. A critical mass of smart meters, for example, would make it possible for utility companies to incentivize customer behavior by offering flexible pricing. That’s good for the utility, good for customer, good for management of flows within the grid, and for consumption reduction.

---