Our view

• Smart meters are going to cost a substantial amount to implement.
  
  
• Smart meters will be of great benefit to the electricity industry. Billing systems will improve.
  
  
• The introduction of punitive pricing at periods of peak demand could adversely affect lower-income households. Consumers may have little choice but to reduce winter-evening heating.
  
  
• A public-education campaign to use night-rate electricity could help reduce peak-demand now using the current metering systems. This would help the industry and consumers, without the cost of introducing smart meters.

Hot water

Water heating makes up around 40 percent of the average household power bill.

Traditionally New Zealand has used a system called ripple control. This allows electricity companies to switch your water heating on or off, depending on the demand on the supply system.

Because water heating has always been under the control of electricity companies, the introduction of smart meters will have little impact on this part of the electricity system.

More information

• Smarter Homes: www.smarterhomes.org.nz
• ConsumerBuild: www.consumerbuild.org.nz
• Energy Efficiency and Conservation Authority (EECA): www.eeca.govt.nz

More from consumer.org.nz

• Energy and heating - our collection of resources on this topic

Smart metering conference
Late last year Consumer NZ spoke at the Advanced Metering Summit, an electricity-industry conference promoting the introduction of smart-metering technology. We were invited to address the conference from a consumer's point of view. Download the full transcript of our speech (Word document, 37.0 KB).

Report by Bill Whitley