Star Trek tech for smart meters? Just what would Scotty think?

A minister has promised that the technology will soon enter a ‘Star Trek phase’ – but the rollout of smart meters does not inspire confidence about their future, says James Moore

The problem is there’s been nothing Star Trek about the smart meter market to date (NBC)

“Beam me up Scotty!”

“Ah, sorry Captain, we cannae do that right now.”

“What? Scotty, we’ve Klingons on one side of us and Romulans on the other. You. Need. To. Get us out of here quick.”

“Well, Captain, it’s like this. We were supposed to have a smart meter fitted. You know, one of the fancy ones that actually works and lets you change suppliers. And, um, well, they brought the wrong one and we’re running low on emergency credit. If we beam you up there’ll be nothing left for life support.”

“What? Have you not contacted the helpline via subspace?”

“Aye Captain. Young Chekov’s on with them now. He’s been on hold for the last three light years and, um, Captain Kirk?… Captain Kirk?”

Star Trek tech is what we’ve been promised when it comes to smart meters, at least by someone called Lord Duncan of Springbank, who bears the august title of Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Minister for Climate Change).

In that capacity, he boldly told a committee of MPs on Wednesday that the “Star Trek phase” of smart meters will allow residents to “run the laundry” when it’s cheap to do so thanks to tariffs that allow for a change in energy costs every half hour or so. The problem is that there’s been nothing Star Trek about smart meters, or the domestic energy market, to date.

Their rollout has looked more like something from the early days of Doctor Who when the sets were built out of cardboard leftovers from Blue Peter and held together with string along with the judicious application of glue.

The first iteration of that show was kept going for years by dint of fans’ willingness to overlook the dodgy sets and second rate special effects because the stories were good.

There’s been nothing much good about the smart meter story to date. Millions of pounds have been spent on marketing and half the country still doesn’t know what the point is. They might be among the lucky ones. Some of the stories that have emerged from those who picked up on the meter messaging and then took the plunge have been positively nightmarish.

Energy companies, which are supposed to instal the things for free, are mostly big, inflexible giants, with customer “service” desks set up to obfuscate and frustrate.

Their bosses are basically Vogons, the heartless green bureaucrats of Hitchhikers’ Guide to the Galaxy fame who delighted in making life miserable for everyone else.

Most government ministers seem cut from the same cloth these days. Some of them are even green, although that might just be the effect Boris Johnson has on them when he gets up to speak. He certainly turns me that colour.

Part of the problem with the first generation of meters was that if you wanted to switch supplier – and switching should be encouraged to keep suppliers honest and prices competitive – they would go stupid.

We’re told the new lot will be Trek-tastic but would you want to rely on that?

A government target called for suppliers to have them in at least 85 per cent of customers’ homes by the end of 2024. The original plan was for suppliers to take all reasonable steps to fit meters by the end of 2020. You can see where this is going, can’t you? Maybe half of us will actually have one by 2020 and the cost of the rollout is soaring.

If you take the British government, add energy suppliers, and then put them in a blender what you end up with isn’t very Trek. It’s just very crap. So that’s hardly a surprise.