I think you’re freaking out over nothing.
You should worry when you, or they, start installing “smart* *appliances* in your home.
Until then, what can they do? There’s NO WAY to selectively enable/disable/control individual power draws. All they could to is cut you off completely. And they aren’t gonna do that.
FWIW, and FRegards
I'm not 'freaking out'. I simply passed on something of interest to the community. Accept or reject at your leisure.
“All they could to is cut you off completely. And they aren’t gonna do that.”
I beg to differ. You mean that making sure ball fields are reconnected first—for baseball games—before reconnecting houses that have been disconnected from storms—has not occurred? Answer: it has, and people have died because of it, in this last week alone.
So, yes, ‘they’ would do that, to political enemies or anyone they care to selectively go after.
Google “General Patraeus appliances watching you” and/or youtube “CIA to spy on Americans using household items”.
There are plenty of bad things they can do without cutting off your service.
They are already comparing customer’s energy use with their neighbors to try and shame them into using less. There will soon be financial penalties for using too much power or just using it at the wrong time of day.
Smart meters are here to stay but the use and distribution of the information gathered must be strictly controlled.
People should be concerned about this.
BTW, I did have an actively controllable device on my electric water heater in the San Diego area back in 1982. The utility could cut power to my water heater to shed load at will.
Yeah, that's the way I see it. How can the meter differentiate between the circuits in the fuse box?
I recently got a letter from my provider (Georgia Power) offering 20¢/kWh during peak hours, and 5¢/kWh during other times. 'Peak hours' are defined as 2-7 pm, M-F. I am seriously considering doing it. Any advice would be appreciated.