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Peco to fast-track installing 'smart' meters

The Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission on Thursday approved Peco's plan to accelerate the installation of smart meters to all 1.6 million customers by the end of 2014, ushering in the age of dynamic electric pricing.

Steven Carbonara, a PECO field technician, installs an upgraded meter in a home in Bristol on April 10, 2011. PECO Energy Co. began installing the first generation of 6000,000 new-generation electric meters in March. They allow the company to give the customer more detailed information about their energy use. ( MICHAEL S. WIRTZ / Staff Photographer )
Steven Carbonara, a PECO field technician, installs an upgraded meter in a home in Bristol on April 10, 2011. PECO Energy Co. began installing the first generation of 6000,000 new-generation electric meters in March. They allow the company to give the customer more detailed information about their energy use. ( MICHAEL S. WIRTZ / Staff Photographer )Read more
    by Andrew Maykuth, Inquirer Staff Writer
    Published 

The Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission on Thursday approved Peco's plan to accelerate the installation of smart meters to all 1.6 million customers by the end of 2014, ushering in the age of dynamic electric pricing.

About 619,000 customers now have the digital devices, and the decision allows Peco to spend $282 million to complete the program five years early. Peco said that the accelerated installation would save $58 million by eliminating the need to maintain two different meter systems until 2019, when it had originally agreed to swap out the older devices.

The new meters are equipped for two-way communication with the utility, allowing for more sophisticated billing, grid management and outage control. A 2008 Pennsylvania law requires big utilities to switch to smart meters no later than 2024.

For consumers, the new meters provide more information on their energy use and will give them the option to choose time-of-use rates, or dynamic pricing. Those tiered prices would encourage customers to switch energy use to off-peak hours.

Peco in October will launch a pilot "Smart Time Pricing" program aimed at some of the 619,000 customers who have the new meters. The program will be operated in partnership with NRG Retail Solutions.

Customers who enroll will get a two-tiered price starting in January and fixed through early 2015. The peak hours - when prices are higher - will be 2 to 6 p.m. weekdays.

Customers will receive a guarantee that the plan will cost them less than Peco's current default service, said Catherine Engel Menendez, the utility's spokeswoman.

The utility industry is promoting smart meters as a key component in upgrading the nation's grid, but the devices have generated some opposition from customers concerned about health risks or the loss of privacy.

Some states allow customers to opt out, but not Pennsylvania.

Peco customers are paying for the devices through a surcharge embedded in their electric rates.

It amounts to about $1.53 a month for a customer using 500 kilowatt hours.

Peco suspended its smart-meter program last year after several of the new devices overheated and caught fire. It replaced 186,000 newly installed devices with equipment from another manufacturer.

Customers who already have smart meters can track their hourly power consumption by logging into their account on www.peco.com.