Florez lays out path to Smart Meter confidence
As Senate Rules Committee debates Peevey confirmation, Florez continues call for aggressive testing

SACRAMENTO – Even as the Senate Rules Committee met to consider confirming Michael Peevey’s continued tenure as president of the California Public Utilities Commission, his work for the next four years was piling up, as Senate Majority Leader Dean Florez (D-Shafter) continued his push to aggressively investigate the accuracy and reliability of “Smart” Meters.

Florez held two district hearings in the wake of multiple consumer complaints that the newly-installed digital meters were causing inexplicable usage hikes, even in homes which were vacant or where the residents were at work.  He wrote to Peevey today, requesting that specific steps be taken in the promised independent testing of PG&E’s meters and suggesting several steps to help ensure successful implementation of the Smart Grid.

In his letter to Peevey, Florez reiterated his frustration that PG&E has not made available to the public or legislators any testing or reliability data on its Smart Meters, saying that at this point, “Only a rigorous and highly detailed examination of PG&E’s smart meter project followed by a program of continuous and long-term use monitoring will restore public confidence in the value of the Smart Grid.”

While the CPUC has said it will require independent testing of Smart Meters by PG&E, the details of what that testing must include have not been revealed.  First and foremost, Florez is calling on the regulator to require a thorough forensic analysis of at least 100 households that have filed Smart Meter complaints, including a historical comparison of usage, an analysis of the impact of rate changes, evaluation of technical problems with replaced meters, an evaluation of PG&E’s attempt to resolve each complaint and a definitive conclusion as to the meters’ accuracy and reliability.

Florez is also calling for testing of a random sample of all deployed meters and evaluation of the communications network that transfers Smart Meter data, including a vulnerability analysis of the system’s security.

Smart Meters are ultimately supposed to give consumers real-time information on their energy usage, so they can make adjustments to save on their bills, but the technology to allow the sort of communication needed to achieve that will not be in place for years.  So far, only the utility itself seems to be saving -- eliminating the labor costs of manually reading older meters -- as many consumers say their bills have increased dramatically despite cutting back on energy consumption.

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