As we enter the era of viewing our energy use, a German utility company has developed an energy meter that tweets usage to a consumer. Yello Strom is apparently the first utility to incorporate Twitter into each meter in the hopes of increasing awareness of consumption and eventually reduced usage.
Smart meters are a new technology that allows consumers to view and manage their energy usage, resulting in an expected reduction in energy consumption on an individual basis. Smart meters identify electricity usage with more detail than conventional meters and relay that information back to the utility company for remote monitoring and billing. Unlike conventional meters, which only measure total energy use, smart meters provide information about when energy has been consumed; thus, allowing the utility to set rates based on time of day and season. So far, more than eight million smart meters have been installed in U.S. homes, according to a market research survey.
Yello Strom, which serves 1.4 million customers in Germany, currently manages meters from households through broadband connections and offers access to Google’s PowerMeter, a new platform that receives information and makes it available via the consumer's iGoogle homepage. The Google gadget even breaks down energy use by household appliance and activities.
Now, Yello Strom has designed each smart meter to have its own Twitter account to keep consumers aware of energy use via tweets.
Yello Executive Director Martin Vesper said, "Our goal is to use as many different channels as possible to inform our customers about their energy consumption."
