Some large industrial customers, such as steel works, already have contracts that allow the national grid to disconnect them at times of peak demand in return for cheaper energy bills. The Sandwell trial is extending the idea to domestic appliances and measuring how much carbon dioxide will be saved for each additional home that joins the scheme.
Npower said that customers would not notice the system working and would be in no danger of losing the contents of the fridges and freezers.
A spokesman said appliances would switch themselves back on if their temperature rose above the recommended level.
He said the same technology could be used to control the charging of electric cars, which will begin to be mass-produced by the end of this year and will become eligible from January for £5,000 government grants. The emissions savings from switching to electric cars will depend on how successful power companies are in managing the potentially huge increase in demand for electricity.
Electric car owners will be able to negotiate a cheaper tariff in return for allowing their energy company to control when their batteries are charged.
The driver will simply plug in and specify when the car will be needed. The grid will ensure that the battery is full at that time.
Paul Lazarevic, managing director of RLtec, which supplied the dynamic demand technology for the trial, said the grid could even draw power back from electric car batteries in order to respond to surges in demand.
However, he said more research was needed into what effect this would have on the life of the batteries.
The npower trial is being conducted under the Government’s Carbon Emissions Reduction Target scheme, which obliges power companies to reduce energy consumption in the home by promoting efficient technology.
Meanwhile, Sony has launched a smart television that automatically dims and reduces power consumption when viewers look away from the screen.
The Bravia LX900 has a camera that uses face recognition technology to detect when viewers are looking down to read a book or have fallen asleep.
does the smart tv notice when people turn their ears off?
Large industrial customers are trying to get lower prices for off peak demand.
The government can take it’s smart grid and try and sell it to Kenya. Oh wait, they won’t let Kenyans build power plants. Weird, I wonder why.
If CO2 is your God, then nuclear power is your savior.
Rev 2.0 of the software will also shut down the screen when it observes the viewer with a heavy object in his hand, reaching back in an arc whose plane intersects the screen.
People basically work from 8 AM to 5 PM.
Give some time for commuting home-—
Then there is a MASSIVE surge in electrical comsumption with all those commuters plugging in their little plastic grocery carts called ELECTRIC CARS. Same commuters start dinner, turn on TV & get up on computers while dinner is cooking. Big surge in usage....nationwide.
Sooooo- the system will shut down until the power pull recedes....& when would that be? midnight? 2 AM?? 2 days later?? Next week?
I have tried & tried to get firm numbers on HOW LONG does it take for these puddle jumper cars to recharge?? Cannot get a straight answer.
The most common answer? “OVERNIGHT”.
Is that 6 hours?
8 Hours?
10 Hours??
12 Hours??
How many KWH does the car require to be fully recharged?
I cannot get that answer, either.
I know how many KWH I use each month to run this property. I calculate what each KWH costs me.
LONG BEFORE I would even consider purchasing anything close to an electric car-—I want these answers.
All I get is a complete run-around.
IF the system is going to shut down when overloaded—whose car will be the one that gets recharged? They cannot ALL get back on line at the same time!
I don’t like one single aspact of this Smart Meter crap & Smart Grid theory. Over 5 million “Smart meters” were installed in Bay Area of San Fran. They are severely overcharging some customers—undercharging others—installed backwards in others—installed improperly in others. Shove it down our throats—& then find out later where the holes are in the technology. This is the same thinking as jumping off the pier without knowing how deep the murky water really is.
It is more control, with no accountability from the power company nor the regulators.
It is a screwing without even an offer of buying me dinner!!
The driver will simply plug in and specify when the car will be needed. The grid will ensure that the battery is full at that time.””
Sure-—NOT.
Hubby & wife both have electric cars...timers are set with ‘grid’ for recharging.
Kid gets hurt—name what emergency you wish of your choice....
How will said emergency get solved??
No car to get where you need to go.
I can add gasoline to my car in a matter of minutes- even if I am low when an emergency strikes. Cannot do the same thing with electric cars.