ravjeff
Club Regular
Posts: 754
Location: New Zealand
Primary Vehicle: RAV4
Model Spec/Trim: GLX
Engine Capacity: 2.5L
Fuel Type: Petrol
Transmission: Automatic
Drive Type: 4WD/AWD
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Post by ravjeff on Jul 13, 2024 4:37:21 GMT
Does anyone else remember the controversy over whether living very close to high voltage power lines could be dangerous to your long term health?
This has recently sprung to mind and made me wonder if the E.M.F. in a full battery EV, PHEV or Hybrid when charging is also a dangerous environment which might cause health problems in the future?
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Post by philip42h on Jul 13, 2024 8:05:44 GMT
I've never even thought about it - the FUD about HV power lines seems to have largely gone away / been forgotten. But the subject is being researched and there's a scholarly article on the subject here: Complex Electromagnetic Issues Associated with the Use of Electric Vehicles in Urban Transportation. I haven't read it all (OK, I just looked at the 'pictures') but it doesn't get as far as suggesting whether or not there could be associated health issues. The same considerations would of course be applicable to electric trains, trams and trolley buses that have been around for decades without any obvious issues. |
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Post by widge on Jul 17, 2024 16:11:58 GMT
One bug difference is overhead cables are probably upwards of 25,000v AC and I would imagine electric vehicles are DC and nowhere near the same voltage. But exactly what difference that might make to environmental and health issues, I haven't a clue.
Mind you have to laugh sometimes, a neighbour was complaining and objecting about the smart meters we have here also about a possible proposed 5g tower nearby, becouse of the possible radiation effects. I said Nick, you spend half your life with a mobile phone stuck to your ear, I don't think it will make much difference. He laughed.🤣🤣
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Post by davrav on Jul 17, 2024 17:19:54 GMT
Smart meters? Don't get me started. Have resisted the things for years but old electric meter went out of certification a few weeks ago so I reluctlantly agreed to have a new 'smart' electric meter fitted. Sent readings for two days then stopped sending. Surprisingly though a daily gas reading was popping up when I logged in to the account. Surprising as the gas meter is still the old analog one  "Oh", said the supplier agent when I contacted them, "we will have to send an engineer to replace the new meter, would you like us to replace the gas meter at the same time"? "What do you think"? says I. "I guess that'll be a no then" says agent. Week later engineer turns up with second new leccy meter and fits it. Then, after an extended period of head scratching and phone peering, he says, "Hmmm, I think I need to add an aerial extension". Arial fitted and more phone peering and he declares all working. That lasted for a day before the gas reading started to appear again and leccy became MIA once more. After a protracted online conversation with an agent I have been told that, "It can take uo to six weeks for the system to fully rationalise". How smart is that? |
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Post by davidwilson on Jul 18, 2024 8:40:05 GMT
Smart meters? Don't get me started. Have resisted the things for years but old electric meter went out of certification a few weeks ago so I reluctlantly agreed to have a new 'smart' electric meter fitted. Sent readings for two days then stopped sending. Surprisingly though a daily gas reading was popping up when I logged in to the account. Surprising as the gas meter is still the old analog one "Oh", said the supplier agent when I contacted them, "we will have to send an engineer to replace the new meter, would you like us to replace the gas meter at the same time"? "What do you think"? says I. "I guess that'll be a no then" says agent. Week later engineer turns up with second new leccy meter and fits it. Then, after an extended period of head scratching and phone peering, he says, "Hmmm, I think I need to add an aerial extension". Arial fitted and more phone peering and he declares all working. That lasted for a day before the gas reading started to appear again and leccy became MIA once more. After a protracted online conversation with an agent I have been told that, "It can take uo to six weeks for the system to fully rationalise". How smart is that? I don't fully understand your situation but a few thoughts from me! I resisted smart meters for years but I had them changed in early March and have been very pleased with the savings due to being able to access other tariffs. I am with Octopus energy and use their Tracker tariff for gas and Agile for electricity. I can say more if anyone interested. |
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Post by three5 on Jul 18, 2024 8:53:17 GMT
Smart meters? Don't get me started. Have resisted the things for years but old electric meter went out of certification a few weeks ago so I reluctlantly agreed to have a new 'smart' electric meter fitted. Sent readings for two days then stopped sending. Surprisingly though a daily gas reading was popping up when I logged in to the account. Surprising as the gas meter is still the old analog one "Oh", said the supplier agent when I contacted them, "we will have to send an engineer to replace the new meter, would you like us to replace the gas meter at the same time"? "What do you think"? says I. "I guess that'll be a no then" says agent. Week later engineer turns up with second new leccy meter and fits it. Then, after an extended period of head scratching and phone peering, he says, "Hmmm, I think I need to add an aerial extension". Arial fitted and more phone peering and he declares all working. That lasted for a day before the gas reading started to appear again and leccy became MIA once more. After a protracted online conversation with an agent I have been told that, "It can take uo to six weeks for the system to fully rationalise". How smart is that? David, I have exactly the same attitude to smart meters that you do and have just received the same communication from Octopus Energy. For about two years I've been answering their telephone calls, accusing them of being a scam caller and putting the phone down - but I suspect that they are under a great deal of pressure from Government to get everyone onto the dammed things. I'm certain that the main reason is so that they can gain an element of control over power useage and avoid unplanned power cuts by turning your supply on and off via the meter to control demand. I don't know anyone who has a smartmeter that has worked properly from the outset. If it's not a rude question, who is your energy supplier?
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Post by three5 on Jul 18, 2024 8:57:48 GMT
Smart meters? Don't get me started. Have resisted the things for years but old electric meter went out of certification a few weeks ago so I reluctlantly agreed to have a new 'smart' electric meter fitted. Sent readings for two days then stopped sending. Surprisingly though a daily gas reading was popping up when I logged in to the account. Surprising as the gas meter is still the old analog one "Oh", said the supplier agent when I contacted them, "we will have to send an engineer to replace the new meter, would you like us to replace the gas meter at the same time"? "What do you think"? says I. "I guess that'll be a no then" says agent. Week later engineer turns up with second new leccy meter and fits it. Then, after an extended period of head scratching and phone peering, he says, "Hmmm, I think I need to add an aerial extension". Arial fitted and more phone peering and he declares all working. That lasted for a day before the gas reading started to appear again and leccy became MIA once more. After a protracted online conversation with an agent I have been told that, "It can take uo to six weeks for the system to fully rationalise". How smart is that? I don't fully understand your situation but a few thoughts from me! I resisted smart meters for years but I had them changed in early March and have been very pleased with the savings due to being able to access other tariffs. I am with Octopus energy and use their Tracker tariff for gas and Agile for electricity. I can say more if anyone interested. I'd be very interested in your thoughts David. |
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Post by philip42h on Jul 18, 2024 9:24:39 GMT
Smart meters? Don't get me started. Have resisted the things for years but old electric meter went out of certification a few weeks ago so I reluctlantly agreed to have a new 'smart' electric meter fitted. Sent readings for two days then stopped sending. Surprisingly though a daily gas reading was popping up when I logged in to the account. Surprising as the gas meter is still the old analog one "Oh", said the supplier agent when I contacted them, "we will have to send an engineer to replace the new meter, would you like us to replace the gas meter at the same time"? "What do you think"? says I. "I guess that'll be a no then" says agent. Week later engineer turns up with second new leccy meter and fits it. Then, after an extended period of head scratching and phone peering, he says, "Hmmm, I think I need to add an aerial extension". Arial fitted and more phone peering and he declares all working. That lasted for a day before the gas reading started to appear again and leccy became MIA once more. After a protracted online conversation with an agent I have been told that, "It can take uo to six weeks for the system to fully rationalise". How smart is that? David, I have exactly the same attitude to smart meters that you do and have just received the same communication from Octopus Energy. For about two years I've been answering their telephone calls, accusing them of being a scam caller and putting the phone down - but I suspect that they are under a great deal of pressure from Government to get everyone onto the dammed things. I'm certain that the main reason is so that they can gain an element of control over power useage and avoid unplanned power cuts by turning your supply on and off via the meter to control demand. I don't know anyone who has a smartmeter that has worked properly from the outset. If it's not a rude question, who is your energy supplier?
You do ...  I took the diametrically opposite view on smart meters and had one from the very first opportunity that I could. And it worked perfectly from the outset. I never expected it to save me any money - I tracked consumption anyway - and there weren't any cheaper "smart meter only" tariffs around at the time, but it saved having a meter reader come to visit. Being an early adopter, it is a SMETS 1 meter so the system failed when I switched suppliers and it took them 3 or 4 years to 'fix' the issue at their end - I still have the same meter, it works perfectly well again and sends meter readings to my supplier every half an hour. The benefit to the supplier is that they can get stats on leccy consumption. The benefit to me is that I don't have to go outside to read the meter. I am probably on a "smart meter only" tariff (again) but not one where I pay a different rate for power used at different times of day. My only issue / complaint would be with the in-home smart meter display and its communication with the smart meter itself. The communication is via a form of wireless and it seriously struggles to maintain connection over less than 5 metres but through a couple of walls - it wouldn't work "all around the house" so I couldn't practically monitor every amp of power usage (if i wanted to). And the in-home smart meter display touch screen is beginning to fail (after around 10 years) so will 'soon' need replacement. |
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Post by davidwilson on Jul 18, 2024 14:42:23 GMT
I don't fully understand your situation but a few thoughts from me! I resisted smart meters for years but I had them changed in early March and have been very pleased with the savings due to being able to access other tariffs. I am with Octopus energy and use their Tracker tariff for gas and Agile for electricity. I can say more if anyone interested. I'd be very interested in your thoughts David. The people who have problems are much more likely to moan about them than the people who are happy and so it is difficult to get a fair reflection of how good a company or product is. Some people do have problems with smart meters but many of the reported problems turn out to be not the smart meter itself but the IHD, or in house display. Historically I was with British Gas and didn't have any problems with the "dumb" meters or the billing. However I decided to switch to Octopus to get the same gas and electricity cheaper. I think it was Which that recommended them year after year as the "best" supplier. So maybe four years ago I switched and saved money. I liked the way the bills were presented and liked the cheaper cost. Then with the energy crisis all the tariffs from all the boards were pretty much the same and costly and to be honest I thought the days of switching were over. Then I discovered there were some "smart" tariffs available if one had a smart meter. I didn't need a smart meter to tell me that my electric fire on an hour would it use more energy than an led lamp but I did like the idea of buying electricity and gas cheaper. So in March I had smart meters fitted by Octopus. I applied online and was booked in for about 2 weeks later. The engineer arrived punctually and knew what to do! Maybe I was lucky but the SMET2 meters are on an outside wall adjacent to each other and worked well from the outset. I don't know all the technical details of how they communicate but I think the gas meter information goes to something on the electricity meter which then sends it on wirelessly. So it helps for the gas readings if the gas meter is physically near the electric one - for some people this will be a problem. I probably should mention I have no low carbon devices at present so my savings are all using traditional things really. The gas Tracker is based on the wholesale price of gas and may change daily. It has always been cheaper every day so far - should this change I can switch to a standard tariff but so far so good. The price varies across regions but today I am paying 4.23 p/kWh compared with about 5.5 on a standard tariff, so a significant saving. For electricity there is a similar Tracker tariff but I am on Agile tariff and that has prices that vary every 30 minutes during the day. |
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Post by davidwilson on Jul 18, 2024 15:03:25 GMT
I am writing on my phone and posted previously before I lost it as sometimes happens!
Agile requires a bit of effort to get the most out of it and won't suit everyone. I think the idea of the tariff is to see if people will change their consumption habits and help to smooth out the demands on the grid. I am sure things will change over the forthcoming years as we obtain energy from different sources and perhaps from the USA.
Anyway from 4pm to 7pm the price of electricity is higher than the rest of the day so it is suitable for people who can "load shift" or just don't use too much at that time. For us we are retired and have our main meal midday and the washing machine and dryer are used in the morning. We also have a gas cooker. However we do still have a bit of a spike with eating and drinking during the high cost times but it still works out to be the best tariff for us at present. Sometimes the half hour slots are incredibly cheap, or free, or even negative cost when we are paid to use the surplus energy that is being produced. So that would be a good time to charge an EV if I had one. Many people also charge a battery in the cheap times and use the energy in the expensive slots. I don't go too mad but when the electricity is negative cost I might switch from heating the house with gas to electric (obviously only when it's cold weather).
I hope that may help someone!
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Post by davrav on Jul 18, 2024 17:04:00 GMT
Smart meters? Don't get me started. Have resisted the things for years but old electric meter went out of certification a few weeks ago so I reluctlantly agreed to have a new 'smart' electric meter fitted. Sent readings for two days then stopped sending. Surprisingly though a daily gas reading was popping up when I logged in to the account. Surprising as the gas meter is still the old analog one "Oh", said the supplier agent when I contacted them, "we will have to send an engineer to replace the new meter, would you like us to replace the gas meter at the same time"? "What do you think"? says I. "I guess that'll be a no then" says agent. Week later engineer turns up with second new leccy meter and fits it. Then, after an extended period of head scratching and phone peering, he says, "Hmmm, I think I need to add an aerial extension". Arial fitted and more phone peering and he declares all working. That lasted for a day before the gas reading started to appear again and leccy became MIA once more. After a protracted online conversation with an agent I have been told that, "It can take uo to six weeks for the system to fully rationalise". How smart is that? David, I have exactly the same attitude to smart meters that you do and have just received the same communication from Octopus Energy. For about two years I've been answering their telephone calls, accusing them of being a scam caller and putting the phone down - but I suspect that they are under a great deal of pressure from Government to get everyone onto the dammed things. I'm certain that the main reason is so that they can gain an element of control over power useage and avoid unplanned power cuts by turning your supply on and off via the meter to control demand. I don't know anyone who has a smartmeter that has worked properly from the outset. If it's not a rude question, who is your energy supplier?
OVO......... |
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Post by widge on Jul 20, 2024 6:39:00 GMT
David, I have exactly the same attitude to smart meters that you do and have just received the same communication from Octopus Energy. For about two years I've been answering their telephone calls, accusing them of being a scam caller and putting the phone down - but I suspect that they are under a great deal of pressure from Government to get everyone onto the dammed things. I'm certain that the main reason is so that they can gain an element of control over power useage and avoid unplanned power cuts by turning your supply on and off via the meter to control demand. I don't know anyone who has a smartmeter that has worked properly from the outset. If it's not a rude question, who is your energy supplier?
You do ... I took the diametrically opposite view on smart meters and had one from the very first opportunity that I could. And it worked perfectly from the outset. I never expected it to save me any money - I tracked consumption anyway - and there weren't any cheaper "smart meter only" tariffs around at the time, but it saved having a meter reader come to visit. Being an early adopter, it is a SMETS 1 meter so the system failed when I switched suppliers and it took them 3 or 4 years to 'fix' the issue at their end - I still have the same meter, it works perfectly well again and sends meter readings to my supplier every half an hour. The benefit to the supplier is that they can get stats on leccy consumption. The benefit to me is that I don't have to go outside to read the meter. I am probably on a "smart meter only" tariff (again) but not one where I pay a different rate for power used at different times of day. My only issue / complaint would be with the in-home smart meter display and its communication with the smart meter itself. The communication is via a form of wireless and it seriously struggles to maintain connection over less than 5 metres but through a couple of walls - it wouldn't work "all around the house" so I couldn't practically monitor every amp of power usage (if i wanted to). And the in-home smart meter display touch screen is beginning to fail (after around 10 years) so will 'soon' need replacement. The smart meters in france do not have a remote display, but you can look at real-time usage directly on the meter. But with an app you can go back through historical data of usage in 1/2 hour increments, but there is usually a delay of a day or so, before the data is available. |
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Post by davidwilson on Jul 20, 2024 19:35:31 GMT
You do ... I took the diametrically opposite view on smart meters and had one from the very first opportunity that I could. And it worked perfectly from the outset. I never expected it to save me any money - I tracked consumption anyway - and there weren't any cheaper "smart meter only" tariffs around at the time, but it saved having a meter reader come to visit. Being an early adopter, it is a SMETS 1 meter so the system failed when I switched suppliers and it took them 3 or 4 years to 'fix' the issue at their end - I still have the same meter, it works perfectly well again and sends meter readings to my supplier every half an hour. The benefit to the supplier is that they can get stats on leccy consumption. The benefit to me is that I don't have to go outside to read the meter. I am probably on a "smart meter only" tariff (again) but not one where I pay a different rate for power used at different times of day. My only issue / complaint would be with the in-home smart meter display and its communication with the smart meter itself. The communication is via a form of wireless and it seriously struggles to maintain connection over less than 5 metres but through a couple of walls - it wouldn't work "all around the house" so I couldn't practically monitor every amp of power usage (if i wanted to). And the in-home smart meter display touch screen is beginning to fail (after around 10 years) so will 'soon' need replacement. The smart meters in france do not have a remote display, but you can look at real-time usage directly on the meter. But with an app you can go back through historical data of usage in 1/2 hour increments, but there is usually a delay of a day or so, before the data is available. I can see practically instantaneous electricity usage for electricity on an app and half hourly usage for gas and electricity as it happens daily. It has given me a better idea, for instance, of how much the gas combi boiler costs for hot water compared with gas central heating. |
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I took the diametrically opposite view on smart meters and had one from the very first opportunity that I could. And it worked perfectly from the outset. I never expected it to save me any money - I tracked consumption anyway - and there weren't any cheaper "smart meter only" tariffs around at the time, but it saved having a meter reader come to visit.