Smart Meters a Dumb Idea?

I've been working on the customer behavior side of smart meters for a couple of years now, and most of the press has been pretty positive. A 4/27/09 WSJ article (R5,7) by Rebecca Smith questions whether smart meters are a dumb idea. The angle of the article is on the cost of installing the smart meters, and that utilities will charge customers for the meter (guess what, utilities have been charging customers for the mechanical dumb meters for years now).

While colleagues have blasted this article from an economic perspective, I've reflected on it from a behavioral perspective. A speaker at a conference I attended said, "If you think feedback isn't important, just count the number of mirrors you have in your home." People thrive on feedback. It is the primary driver for helping people improve their lives. While the recipe for saving energy is relatively simple -- turning things off -- the question really is when and what we turn off so that we maintain a level of comfort. Energy waste is the villian here, and smart meters, as a core technology for enhancing a coproduction experience of vision, access, incentive, and expertise, is one of the more valuable solutions to come around in a long time to help us be better consumers.