Business

Con Ed’s new meters tell how much gas, electric you use

By
Bill Sanderson
Published June 4, 2016, 7:30 p.m. ET

Your Con Edison bill will get smarter and more detailed in the coming years as the utility invests $1.4 billion in new gas and electric meters that generate real-time data about everyone’s energy use.

Between 2017 and 2022, Con Ed plans to install 3.6 million new electric smart meters and 1.2 million new gas smart meters in all its customers’ homes and businesses.

Westchester County and Staten Island will start getting meters in mid-2017. They’ll appear in Brooklyn and Manhattan in 2018, and in Queens and the Bronx in 2019.

The project will “fundamentally transform Con Edison’s relationship with its customers,” the company tells state regulators. But it’s not clear if the plan will curb Con Ed’s residential electricity prices, which 2014 federal data show are 130 percent above the national average.

Con Ed says the smart meter plan is the biggest capital project in its 193-year history. It will buy the smart meters with money taken from rate-payers’ pockets over a period of years.

Data from the new meters will let Con Ed set prices based on customers’ time of use. Rates might jump during summer hours when hot weather makes people turn on their air conditioners, or drop overnight when power use is lowest.

The meters will also give customers real-time data about their gas and electric use through an app.

Con Edison lags in smart meter technology, which is already in about half of American homes. When Con Ed’s project is completed, Los Angeles will be the last of the nation’s 10 biggest cities without full smart meter deployment, the Edison Institute says.

Consumer advocates are casting a wary eye on the smart meter plan.

“Does this lead to the utility charging more at high usage times? Is this leading us down the road to a new rate design? We don’t know,” said Bill Ferris, AARP’s state legislative director.

AARP notes that in a recent Public Service Commission filing, Con Ed admitted it could not “ensure” smart meters would benefit the company or its customers.