However there are provisions now being designed into smart meters today for (expected) future wireless communication into the home, in part as a result of government-led initiatives like in California. The communications into a home can either use the same radio networks the smart meters communicate over back to the utility company for automatic meter reading, or they will require extra radios installed in the meters to communicate into a home on a separate radio network, such as a Zigbee network for example.

The problem is even with this capabillity the latest smart meter designs have limited bandwidth for communicating with more than one device in the home, since their internal electronics' primary functions are basic metrology and meter interval reading for utility billing purposes.

A novel concept is to have one device in the home function both as a center of intelligence AND as a wireless communication portal to the meter's internal metrology data AND the utility company via the meter's radio network. I agree that a thermostat is not the most ideal device to serve as this, but utility companies only see the biggest bang for their dollar in that air conditioning control gives them the biggest results for automated demand response.

Much better ideas for this central in-home device is either your home's PC with a radio hanging off a USB port and all the necessary software, or, a much lower cost device such as an in-home energy display that has enough software and radio technology in it just for this purpose.

Bob Amorosi Resident of Ontario Canada

You have pointed out the big flaw with demand response systems as envisioned by many utility companies and some governments. The majority of the public will never accept their utility company or anyone else controlling their home's environment directly.

It would be far more widely accepted in the public if the utility companies sent only energy pricing signals to homes as they change with strain on the grid and generation systems. In this scenario consumers with in-home demand response technology could themselves program and set up their systems to respond to energy price thresholds as they see fit, or not repsond at all if they choose. However utility companies generally do not like this scenario because if they raise energy prices to encourage demand responses, the amount of power demand shed from the grid would be very uncertain, especially if there is no feedback to the utility about which homes are shedding power consumption. However when the utility company can control these systems directly, they will know precisely how many homes they are "shutting down".

There are many technology companies ready to pounce on providing consumers with new technology for consumer-controlled in-home automation just for this purpose, but they are at the mercy of the utility companies and in-action by governments to change the rules governing them.

I think many utility companies know this but they don't care especially since in many regions all they need to avert excessive peak demand is a small percentage of homes to sign up for systems that are under THEIR control. In Ontario Canada for example utility companies offer a special "peak-saver" thermostat equipped with a pocket-pager receiver, installed free to consumers who want one. Then on hot summer days when the electricity system is strained, the utility company sends control signals through the pager system temporarily shutting those people's air conditioners down by ratchetting up the temperature settings on them. They try to entice consumers to accept one by promising to keep you comfortable while at the same time saving you some money on your energy bill.

Bob Amorosi Resident of Ontario Canada

Thanks, Jess

The California Energy Commission is on the fast track to political backlash with these proposals. Worst, this pits the coastal elites against the working class Central Valley. You don't need AC in Malibu or Greenbrae or La Jolla or San Francisco but life in Fresno or Redding or Bakersfield is just about unbearable without it.

Why not just build more nuclear power plants? Or how about disconnecting the AC in the government offices in Sacramento?

You do, however, raise the ligitimate concern of who will decide what is appropriate under what conditions. The CEC can only define the technology. It is the PUC and individual MUNIs who will define how (or even if) it can be used. As far as I know, that issue has not hit any radar screens yet and might not until the number of PCTs is great enough that, in aggregate, they start to look like a real resource.

A read of the posted revisions shows that the PCT will be able to adjust your thermostat to ANY temperature, up or down, during "emergency" conditions. See section 112 (c)(2(B) on page 63. You, the home owner or renter, will NOT be able to override it.

I have three points of contention with this proposal. First, " a man's home is his castle" and for the long arm of state power to reach into the home and adjust one's room temperature is a violation of that principle. Secondly, the burdens will fall disporportionately on the Central Valley, the mountains, and southern deserts while the benefits, in aggregrate, will be realized by the coastal populations. Lastly, we have better, less invasive, more common sense, alternatives, namely, build more nukes!

One minor point is that, besides the free riders on the temperate coasts, a PCT will be easy to subvert. Replacement with bootleg thermostats won't be difficult. Even building a metal wire box around could block the FM signals much like the poor radio reception inside a metal building. A low power FM transmitter might cost $10.

The state has wasted BILLIONS of our money on relatively useless wind and solar generation that does little to prevent "emergency" conditions. PCTs are the wrong solution to a problem we never should have had.

And Karen, if the system is designed to implement a free market without reference to what specific appliances or loads are to be controlled, there is absolutely no reason it should ever become obsolete, not in ten or fifty years.

Your mention of subverting PCTs with bootleg replacements or even Faraday shielding built around them to block their radio control signals explains much more than you can imagine.

Firstly, it points out the simple fact that most consumers will be abhorrent and refuse to have someone outside their home monitor or control their home's environment, since it smells of privacy invasion.

Secondly, this is PRECISELY the reason why this kind of technology has never been embraced and developed by meter manufacturers and utility companies before.

Utility meters, whether they are the old electromechanical or new smart meters, are industrial products with high reliability, warranties, and field support. Most importantly they are sold to a utility company and under their exclusive control. But it is quite another matter to make equipment for inside the home that intimately operates with a consumer's home appliances. There are huge issues with monitoring (for load shedding verification), warranty repairs, consumer complaints, etc. that the meter manufacturers and utility companies historically want no part of, since ultimately this technology would be in the hands of consumers and out of their control.

What Len talks about would be ideal - if consumers could purchase in-home technology that they themselves can set up and control, and program as they see fit to respond or not respond to energy pricing or financial incentives from their utility company. This concept however requires utility companies and in-home technology manufacturers to work together to develop and commercialize it. This however is foreign to the utility industry, since our utility companies are generally not interested in becoming heavily involved in new technology development and then retailing it to consumers.

Your mention of subverting PCTs with bootleg replacements or even Faraday shielding built around them to block their radio control signals explains much more than you can imagine.

Firstly, it points out the simple fact that most consumers will be abhorrent and refuse to have someone outside their home monitor or control their home's environment, since it smells of privacy invasion.

Secondly, this is PRECISELY the reason why this kind of technology has never been embraced and developed by meter manufacturers and utility companies before.

Utility meters, whether they are the old electromechanical or new smart meters, are industrial products with high reliability, warranties, and field support. Most importantly they are sold to a utility company and under their exclusive control. But it is quite another matter to make equipment for inside the home that intimately operates with a consumer's home appliances. There are huge issues with monitoring (for load shedding verification), warranty repairs, consumer complaints, etc. that the meter manufacturers and utility companies historically want no part of, since ultimately this technology would be in the hands of consumers and out of their control.

What Len talks about would be ideal - if consumers could purchase in-home technology that they themselves can set up and control, and program as they see fit to respond or not respond to energy pricing or financial incentives from their utility company. This concept however requires utility companies and in-home technology manufacturers to work together to develop and commercialize it. This however is foreign to the utility industry, since our utility companies are generally not interested in becoming heavily involved in new technology development and then retailing it to consumers.

The first sentence of your final paragraph (referring to Len's earlier discussion of an in-home technology) is exactly what the PCT is intended to be - a device that can be programmed by the customer to respond to utility pricing, or not. Expansion ports will allow customers to integrate the PCT with other appliance controls systems and respond according to their own decisions based on the price at the time.

I don't believe that the second part of the paragraph is accurate. Utilities are not required to be involved in the development of the device. There need not be any load shed verification. The customer receives price signals and is charged for usage as measured by the utility's interval meter. If they use less during high price periods, they pay less. If they shield the receiver on the PCT, they will simply pay the higher price. Like a PC modem or a television set, if their PCT is not receiving a signal and so does not respond, they have an incentive to get it fixed. The utility need not be involved except in the sending of the price signal according to the standard format understood by the PCT.

As for the emergency functionality... Although it is intended as a secondary function, it unfortunately tends to be the part of the PCT that people focus on as being unpalatable... and in general, I agree with their concerns. There is indeed a danger of it being used improperly. The intent of the CEC is that it be used for extreme emergencies, i.e. to avoid blackouts. But as I said before, the CEC is not the one writing the rules on how the technology is used - the PUC and MUNIs are. There is some point at which the use of the emergency function is justifiable to avoid the loss of all AC (and everything else) as a result of blackouts - and there is another point at which the use of the emergency function constitutes a violation of a (wo)man's castle. Somewhere in-between is where the line needs to be drawn in determining the rules. I don't know where that line is, and I don' t necessarily trust that the PUC in conjunction with the utilities will choose it properly either.

So in closing, I'll say that: (1) The PCT is no longer an intiative that can be killed, it is part of California law (2) I support the development of control devices that respond to electricity pricing according to customer choice (3) I understand the State's desire for emergency response one step below blackouts, but sympathize wholeheartedly with those concerned that it might be used improperly. For this last, we will all need to be diligent in following the PUC proceedings on if, when and how this emergency functionality can be used. I personally support the strictest use of this function, if any at all.

I admit I am not totally familiar with the California PCT initiative, and I'm glad to see that the consumer has some programming control over its use.

While it's true utility companies are not normally capable of developing new technologies, and shouldn't really be expected to, they do have a major role to play in supporting its development. Technology suppliers normally do the actual development but only when there is a perceived market for it. Utility companies must show they want it and are willing to invest in and support it. Even utility companies who may recognize its benefits and may want it have generally been unwilling to pay for it to provide it to consumers, since they would be faced with having to recover the cost through billing rates - something that is also very unpalatable.

An alternate commercial scenario is retailing new technology to consumers directly where only those consumers who are willing to purchase it would get it. But manufacturers developing it would still need the cooperation of the utility companies to support it, and then additionally become involved in the (unpleasant) retail end of it.

So as in California, it requires government legislation to force it to happen.

Proving a negative is difficult though. If Karen or someone can point to a specific statute authorizing a requirement for PCTs, please share.

I suspect that CEC is exceeding their statutory authority in this case and will make a comment on the docket to that effect.

If an elected legislator wants to stand up and be counted in favor of government control of citizens' thermostats, let him or her do so.

BTW, email from Karen did point out that I used the word "unbearable." However, her comment changed the implications of my meaning - I said Fresno without AC is unbearable (OK, I'm a heat wuss) not that an AC setting of 78 or 80 degrees was unbearable.

In Ontario Canada the "peak saver" thermostats offered to consumers by utility companies are a predecessor to the California PCT technology, using the pager system for the radio signals from the utility company. Unlike California they currently have no future expandability as relay devices to other in-home devices. And consumers who have them can override them by calling into their utility company one month ahead of time to opt out of their control, for 30 day periods at a time if they choose. So it's either full or no utility control for 30 days at a time.

While I don't have statistics on the number deployed, there are probably not many as a percentage of the total population. Moreover they are totally funded by the Ontario provincial government, where the marketing and advertising schemes to promote them to interested consumers are devised for the utility companies with the help of the Ontario Power Authority.

So in effect in Ontario, there is no law mandating that all consumers must have one, but utilities are forced to offer them by the government as part of the government's massive campaign to promote conservation and demand curve levelling through load shifting.

Bob Amorosi, Resident of Ontario Canada

http://www.americanthinker.com/2008/01/who_will_control_your_thermost.html

Here's a MSM validation:

http://nctimes.com/articles/2008/01/08/news/top_stories/1_02_261_7_08.txt

My apologies. You are correct - the PCT is not yet required by law. It is still under review.

It appears that the California Enegy Commission is run by people who either don't know what tyranny looks like or don't care.

In either case, they've embarassed the administration of Governor Arnold Swartzenegger around the globe and driven the citizens of the state of California to near rebellion.

This issue has focused light on the state's policy of "Conservation First" and its creation of electricity shortages by deliberate policy.

BTW, a "law" is in a Constitution or is passed by the legislature and signed by the Governor. This was a "regulation" created by adminstrative act of the executive branch under authorizing law.

my undertsanding is that peak demand situations are on the order of 10's of hours per year. (I think this is true for CA, rest of USA, Europe. Not sure about developing countries.)

Everyone benefits from demand-side methods to cut down the peaks and, in fact, to smooth the load profile in general. It is about making a lower-impact grid infrastructure.

i agree -- leave me alone and let me control my own thermostat. BUT give me information on when and how i can "help". also, i undertsand that time-of-use and critical-peak-pricing schemes must be employed to get a large percentage of us to have the "incentive" to respond.

open it up for innovation and let energy service companies find the right balance. BUT don't make me sign up for an energy management service plan. i will do it when i am ready (like when my kids bug me to do my part to save the world).

the comment about central valley versus San Francisco is true but what is to be done about it? running the A/C costs money no matter how you slice it. Some additional common-sense actions of duct-leak sealing, improved insulation, radiant barriers, heat pumps, etc., can also have a big impact. often this is even true on brand new homes