Do I have to use a Digital Meter?

[BVSecretary]

Does AGL mandate the use of digital meters?

[barjacko42]

As a pensioner installing the digital meter, are there likely to be any monetary benefits to me ?

[Lester · Accepted solution]

Possibly @barjacko42 and you probably have some flexibility as a pensioner to make a few changes for the better price wise.

Read Neil C's post here . . .

https://neighbourhood.agl.com.au/t5/Meters-Connections/Do-I-have-to-use-a-Digital-Meter/m-p/29398/hi... 

Covers TOU benefits over single rate, but . . . it all depends on YOUR location, plans available, tariff rates for YOUR location, etc.

You will see just the disparity in the various states / territories avg pricing per kwh of electricity below . . .

ACT  - 23.67c/kWh

NSW - 33.84c/kWh

NT  -   27.37c/kWh

QLD - 30.21c/kWh

SA  -  45.54c/kWh

TAS - 28.12c/kWh

VIC - 28.45c/kWh

WA  - 30.06c/kWh

. . . so it pays to do you research on the energy made easy website, punch in your address and look through the various offers, plans, rates, and associated times of various tariffs.

https://www.energymadeeasy.gov.au/ 

Yes, it's VERY complicated . . . by design ??

[Lester]

Meant to also add @barjacko42 . . .

Have spoken to a lot of solar and battery people in the past 6 months, and all have mentioned that digital meters will pretty much be mandated in the next year or three.

Makes sense, no more guessing as to readings, always up to date for previous day by later afternoons, not more labour reading meters manually.

So probably best to go to one on your terms, picking the best plan you can, and using power to best suit your needs / cost reduction.

[RichardP]

In short, no. The "benefits" are all one way. It lets the retailer do away with meter readers, the energy supplier can monitor useage in real time which will aid them in load shedding. It also gives the supplier the ability to isolate individual properties or specific areas if they want to. The supplier can also isolate solar arrays if they want to reduce input into their grid and if electrical appliances, such as air conditioners, are fitted with the correct hardware they will also be able to turn them off.

So from the perspective of the consumer there is no benefit to having one.

[dmus11]

For some time now anyone trying to understand their residential electricity consumption and future energy needs is facing a much more complicated challenge.  You've simply demonstrated that in your posts.  A person almost needs to be a power plant operator to derive the greatest benefit from the TOU rates being applied.  Most people wouldn't be bothered and will have better things to do than play around on spreadsheets every day with the anxiety generated if your kids are having hot showers at the wrong time of the evening or your partner is cooking dinner at peak time rates.  Clearly a correctly operating digital meter is essential for suppliers to gather an elemental analysis of your energy use.  So why are they really doing this?  The reality is that the market operator AEMO, is currently curtailing the wholesale supply when it's being over supplied at times when the market doesn't need it.  And most of this is coming from rooftop PV solar.  So they are threatening to charge suppliers for NOT reducing supply at certain times.  As a result the whole system is moving towards TOU management through TOU pricing.  In time we will likely start to see behind the meter virtual power plants.  Then your spreadsheets might become useful if you start trading your energy into the network through your rooftop solar infeed or local storage.  Once the protocols for V2G and H2G become available it will then be possible to become a true energy trader, particularly if community batteries become cheaper over time and if there is greater EV penetration in the transport sector.  Using all this distributed storage also reduces the need for the tax payer investment into grid scale solar and wind farms as well as the new transmission that has to go with it.  The greatest problem is that no current political party has thought out the total end to end transition pathway to a new energy system and how it might be managed.