PG&E customers get first chance to opt out of SmartMeters
| Wednesday, Feb 01 2012 05:51 PM
Last Updated Wednesday, Feb 01 2012 05:52 PM
How to opt out
PG&E says customers who want to exchange their SmartMeter for a traditional, analog meter can do so by signing up online at pge.com, stop by the utility's downtown office near H and 19th streets, or call 866-743-0263.
State regulators gave customers of Pacific Gas and Electric Co. a way Wednesday to opt out of the company's residential SmartMeters, the remote devices that have been met with strong skepticism in Bakersfield since their introduction here in 2006.
The preliminary program approved by the California Public Utilities Commission allows PG&E to charge customers a one-time fee of $75, plus $10 a month, to switch to traditional, analog meters. Qualified low-income customers are to pay $10 one time, plus $5 a month. Such charges are to be added to customers' regular bills.
The fee schedule, expected to be revised once commission staff determine the utility's actual compliance costs, also applies to the 90,000 PG&E customers who signed up to keep their analog meters while regulators decided whether to offer opt-outs. Fewer than 1 percent of PG&E's Kern County customers have signed up for the this "delay list," a company representative said.
SmartMeters are designed to give ratepayers timely information about their use of power so they can make adjustments that can lower their bills.
But the meters sparked considerable controversy in Bakersfield when many customers saw their power bills skyrocket in summer 2009 -- a phenomenon PG&E blamed on a heat wave that coincided with a nearly 25 percent rate hike.
Not long afterward, PG&E customers elsewhere in the state began opposing the devices because they emit electromagnetic waves that, in large doses, are suspected of causing health problems.
An independent study commissioned by the state in 2010 largely exonerated PG&E SmartMeters, though consumer advocates contend that the study was lacking in key areas. For its part, PG&E said its own poor customer outreach was to blame for the devices' negative reputation.
The interim plan approved Wednesday lowered the ratepayer costs proposed Jan. 13 by commission staff. That proposal called for a one-time fee of $90, plus $15 a month; the cost to qualified low-income customers was the same as what was put in place Wednesday.
The San Francisco-based, investor-owned utility initially resisted giving customers a chance to opt out of the program. Eventually it agreed to extend the option -- at a cost of $270 plus $14 a month.
PG&E's senior vice president and chief customer officer, Helen Burt, welcomed the commission's ruling in an afternoon phone conference with news reporters.
"We will work as quickly as possible to exchange the meters," she said, adding that the process could be accomplished in a matter of weeks, depending how many customers participate. She said the company expects that number will not exceed 150,000, or about 1.7 percent of the PG&E customers who now have SmartMeters.
Consumer advocates and some customers had argued that opting out of the SmartMeter program should be free to low-income ratepayers. But the commission decided that PG&E must be able to recover its own costs, which include buying and installing refurbished analog meters, as well as sending out meter men to read them.
The program only applies to PG&E, even though other investor-owned utilities California are rolling out smart meters, or have plans to do so.
Commission President Michael Peevey noted in a news release that smart meter technology has been adopted around the world.
"We are not reversing that transition by allowing for an analog opt-out," he said in the release, "but we are recognizing that certain customers prefer an analog meter."
Other utilities across the country have rolled out smart meters as part of a nationwide push to make the power grid more responsive to shifts in supply and demand. The utility industry had watched PG&E's SmartMeter backlash with apprehension, worried that it would hamper efforts intended to help customers.
The Environmental Defense Fund, a New York-based environmental advocacy nonprofit, released a statement that it supported the commission's decision, even as there was little evidence supporting customers' skepticism.
"Today's ruling strikes the proper balance: sustaining progress toward a smart grid with its multiple public health benefits while addressing individuals' concerns," the statement said.
PG&E's Burt emphasized that, despite its support for the opt-out program, the company remains dedicated to developing the nation's smart grid.
"We do believe it's incredibly important that we moved forward on the smart grid," she said.
