I have no doubt that a smarter grid will eventually benefit all classes of customers. Industrial and commercial customers when properly informed will leverage smart meter data to improve their bottom line financials. However, I am not convinced that most residential customers will want to be as engaged with the real time pricing information provided by their smart meters the way they play with apps on their smart phones. Seeing the price of electricity spike on a hot summer day does not provide the same thrill as receiving a video of your grandson two states away kick the winning goal in a soccer game. Ever leave home without your cell phone? Just ten years ago, this question would not have made much sense. Now just reading it can generate mild discomfort. Fast forward to the evolution of the smart grid. Will not knowing the latest kWh prices generate that same feeling of discomfort? I don’t think so. However, not being able to charge your smart phone can and will continue to generate distress. The bottom line for all classes of customers is that they want to know electricity is there when they need it, which is pretty much 24/7. And therein lies the greatest benefit of the smart grid…greater reliability. The updated digitized smart grid will improve outage response times and in some cases prevent outages. The smart meters will provide additional data to help utilities provide better service. A side effect of this upgraded technology is that the smart meter will provide additional data. The very thing that is helpful can also be viewed a con as it raises privacy concerns.
Utilities should consider these sensitive privacy issues when implementing their smart meter programs. The first step will be a well thought out privacy policy. The second step is making sure your call center has sufficient talking points to articulate your privacy policy. The basics of the policy should provide information on how customer specific usage data (“CEUD”) will be treated, to what extent it will be shared with third parties and how customers can prevent it. PG&E’s Customer Information Privacy Policy is a good model.
Last year DOE had a Request for Information on this very issue and on October 5, 2010, issued a detailed report that contained the following recommendations:
- Consumer education and flexibility in both technology and pace of deployment will be critical to the long-term success of Smart Grid technologies.
- Many Smart Grid technologies can generate highly detailed, or “granular,” energy-consumption data that should be accorded privacy protections because it is both potentially useful and sensitive.
- Utilities should continue to have access to CEUD and to be able to use that data for utility-related business purposes like managing their networks, coordinating with transmission and distribution-system operators, billing for services and compiling it into anonymized and aggregated energy-usage data for purposes like reporting jurisdictional load profiles.
- Consumers should be able to access CEUD and decide whether third-parties are entitled to access CEUD for purposes other than providing electrical power.
- All classes of electric utility customers should be entitled to protect the privacy of their own individual energy-usage data.
- Deployment strategies must be flexible for utilities serving rural, low-income, minority or elderly customers and consider the special circumstances of those customers, but should not presume that Smart Grid technologies are inappropriate or unhelpful to such customers.
- States must carefully consider the conditions under which consumers can authorize third-party access to CEUD.
- To promote further cooperation and dissemination of information about practices relating to the regulation of the privacy and data-protection aspects of smart-grid technologies, a web portal should be created to act as a “clearinghouse” for such data.