Edinburgh Napier University

  Smart meters have become a matter of concern for
many populations, although the technology is as always
politically neutral. The focus on electricity rather than all
metered services, water, gas and electricity is one aspect of this
public concern.
The heavy emphasis on Smart Grids, overall energy supply
stability [1] and the extension of control into the home by
power generators, allied to poor communications by
governments and power generators in a range of countries
have led to an increasingly well founded series of problems:
1. Asymmetries in power between consumer and
supplier
2. Privacy issues [2, 3]
3. Data ownership issues
4. And, largely due to limited communications and thus
community confidence, concerns over RF radiation
effects [4].
The paper examines some of the user-side issues in context,
and the imbalances between industry and consumer, how these
have been addressed to date, and ways forward.