Effective energy management needs a regular measurement of energy usage throughout the day, commonly every half-hour in commercial settings. A well-designed metering system helps a consumer to identify potential energy savings and actions to take; often very simple changes can result in major savings, such as identifying equipment that will not use over a weekend and making sure that it is switched off on a Friday evening.
A full monitoring, metering and targeting system has three components:
- A meter to monitor energy usage on an interval basis, for example electricity consumption per half hour;
- A communications system, that takes information from the meter and transmits it to the user or service provider over a telephone line, mobile network or the internet; and,
- Display hardware and software, that allows the user to view current usage, estimate future usage and track consumption patterns over time
An advanced meter is any form of metering system which provides a greater degree of energy consumption data beyond that used for basic billing.
A smart meter is an advanced meter with two way communication, allowing external control of the meter’s functions. This added capability gives users of smart meters the potential to limit energy supply at times of high demand.
Net metering takes account of the electricity supplied to and taken from the grid. Where the meter measures the inbound and outbound electricity flow separately this enables a ‘feed-in’ tariff system, where consumers receive a different price for electricity supplied to the grid than they pay for consuming from the grid.