This commentary was originally posted by Andrew Maykuth, on the philly.com website.
A proposal that would allow Pennsylvania utility customers to opt out of having “smart meters” installed in their houses generated little support Tuesday at a hearing in Harrisburg..
Members of the House Consumer Affairs Committee expressed bipartisan skepticism about the need for legislation that would modify a 2008 law that gives utilities 15 years to install smart meters, which allow them to monitor usage in real time at a household level and to charge hourly prices to customers who choose time-of-use rates.
Opposition to the two-way meters, which can take readings every few minutes, has emerged in pockets across the country from customers concerned about the loss of privacy, government mandates, and alleged health issues related to wireless data transmissions.
“I guess it’s an antigovernment phenomenon going on out there, but government is necessary in some cases,” Robert W. Godshall (R., Montgomery), the committee’s chairman, said in an interview. He said opposition was being led by some members of the tea party.
“Why is it there are people who would want to go back to yesteryear?” asked Rep. Joseph Preston Jr., the committee’s Democratic chair.
Members of the panel, which approved the meter mandate in 2008, said remote-metering technology had been in use for decades. Peco Energy Co., the Philadelphia utility, converted its 1.6 million customers to remote wireless meters in 2003, allowing the company to phase out meter readers. This year, it began installing “advanced metering infrastructure,” though Peco has stopped calling the devices “smart meters.”
Godshall, who lives near Souderton, is a customer of PPL Electric Utilities, which installed bidirectional smart meters for its 1.4 million customers a decade ago. PPL’s devices transmit hourly meter readings on its power lines rather than by radio.
“I haven’t heard a single complaint in all the 12 years,” Godshall said. “I don’t understand why all of a sudden it has become an issue.”
The bill’s sponsor, Rep. Mike Reese (R., Westmoreland), who was elected after the legislature approved the Act 129 conservation law that included the smart-meter mandate, said opposition in his Western Pennsylvania district emerged after the utility First Energy began to charge customers a separate fee in its bills to pay for its smart-meter program.
“Many of our constituents are asking us to address these concerns,” he said.