XPost: can.internet.highspeed, can.general   
   From: Some@Guy.com   
      
   By the end of this year, most (or all?) residential hydro meters in   
   Ontario will be replaced with electronic meters capable of recording   
   your home's electricity used on a time-of-day basis.   
      
   In some cities, that information will be electronically communicated to   
   the utility company (not sure exactly how - it might vary by city).   
      
   In Toronto, instead of having a device in the home (a small wall-mounted   
   read-out device, for example) to show you your real-time use, you will   
   instead have to log onto Toronto Hydro's web site and (using a pin or   
   some code) request to see your hydro useage (yes, you'll have to fire up   
   an electricity consuming device like a desktop computer just to see how   
   much electricity you're using).   
      
   But what Toronto hydro (and other utility companies) gets is a goldmine   
   of IP-to-street-address information that they can leverage in many ways,   
   most notably to sell it to third parties.   
      
   There are already IP geo-location services that maintain databases of   
   IP-to-city mappings, but never before has there been the ability for a   
   third party (like hydro utilities) to create an absolutely accurate   
   database that knows and tracks individual IP's to their street address.   
      
   It's bad enough that these meters are gaining a reputation for incorrect   
   readings that have cost some Ontario citizens lots of time and money   
   fighting with their utility company to resolve, but now they are forcing   
   us to use a very un-ergonomic and inconvienent way to actually know what   
   our real-time energy usage is - which was the whole point of rolling out   
   these new meters (to get us to change our behavior *before* we decide to   
   turn on our AC on a hot summer day, etc).   
      
   It's been shown that individual residential customers do not use enough   
   electricity to warrant these time-of-use meters.  For example, if an   
   individual knows that for him to turn on his AC on a hot summer   
   afternoon will cost him 95 cents for 8 hours of cooling on that day, the   
   odds are that they will opt for that charge in the same way that someone   
   with a mild desire for a coffee will pull into a tim horton's and spend   
   $1.25 for something they could have brewed at home for pennies.  The   
   cost of operating these meters (on an aggregate basis) for the utility   
   company has been shown to be something like $5 per meter per year -   
   about 10 times what the old meters cost.   
      
   And, as I've said, we see that you must give up your IP privacy when   
   seeking out your home's hydro useage.  An absolute mapping between your   
   IP address and your home address will become known, and no-doubt will be   
   sold to others.   
      
   Bottom line:   
      
   We are getting screwed in several directions over these meters.  Their   
   use for residential customers does not make financial sense (both in   
   terms of what these meters cost, the cost to install and operate them)   
   and they are not even implimented in a way that allows them to provide   
   feedback to home owners in a way that fulfills their operating concept   
   or reason for existance in the first place.  They have been shown to   
   provide incorrect information regarding real electricity usage, and they   
   are not traceable to any division of Ontario Weights and Measures   
   certification body.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)