Texas to Open Formal Smart Meter "Opt Out" Rulemaking

The Public Utility Commission of Texas will open a formal rulemaking on providing electric customers with some form of ability to "opt out" of certain functionalities of smart meters.

Although no policy decision has been reached, Commissioners' discussion yesterday in agreeing to open a formal proceeding focused on allowing customers to elect to disable the radio and two-way communication functionality of advanced meters, rather than allowing customers to remove installed advanced meters or decline to have an advanced meter installed.

Commissioners stressed that customers electing to disable the two-way communication of a smart meter, or elect some other opt-out mechanism, should be allocated all incremental costs associated with that decision.

Furthermore, customers should be required to acknowledge that as a result of their decision to disable two-way communication, they will likely face longer outage restoration times, and a longer switching process for enrolling with a new retail electric provider.

Commissioner Kenneth Anderson suggested that to the extent the Commission allows the customer to have the AMS meter physically removed (and not just have communication disabled), the customer should be able to bypass the AMS surcharge, though they would still be subject to all the incremental costs associated with the opt-out.

Anderson also noted that TDUs may be able to address certain customers' desire for an opt-out by moving the smart meter at least 6 feet from the premises, at which point studies have shown no impact from the smart meter.

Should a smart meter "opt-out" be adopted, the Commission noted that Staff will need to revisit the customers protection rules which were rewritten to accommodate the functionality of smart meters. Among other things, as noted above, this may include a longer switching time period for changes in the customer's REP, including potentially a return to the prrio, up-to 45-day switching period, for customers without a two-way communicating advanced meter.