Below is TOC columnist Leong Sze Hian’s letter to the Today newspaper, published on 10 December 2008:
I REFER to the reduction of the electricity tariff by 25 per cent in January.
According to the Energy Market Authority’s (EMA’s) chart on fuel oil price versus the low tension tariff, the tariff was $22.62 in January this year when fuel oil was $96.64.
Since the tariff is pegged to fuel oil, why is the tariff for January next year, at $22.93, higher than that in January this year, when fuel oil is now lower at $92.99 compared to $96.64 in January this year?
This means that year-on-year, despite a 4-per-cent fall in fuel oil, the tariff increased by 1 per cent. So, is the tariff pegged to fuel oil or not?
The 25-per-cent decrease is relative to October’s 21-per-cent increase.
Against the tariff of $23.88 in April, the decrease is only 4 per cent, and is still 1 per cent higher than January’s $22.62.
With all the Utilities-Save (U-Save) rebates to help Singaporeans, why has the number of households in arrears increased from 3,600 in 2006 to 5,090 in October, and the number on the Pay As You Use (PAYU) meter scheme also increased from 12,200 in December 2006 to 13,243?
———–
***
***
Listen eveline, if you could persuade your bosses to give me some money for a tank of gas to go to Russia to start my business – I will gladly meet them all somewhere and scribble down the equations on a napkin and even walk them through how they can even break even within 12 months with what I’ve just proposed here.
I kid you not! I admit, I cant do this all by myself, I probably need the help of the ASDF and probably darkness to flesh out the finer details but this offer is kosher, its good to go.
Need I remind you. We live in a $2.2 million society. You’re never going to get free consultancy online. All you’re going to get is Hors d’œuvres – that’s why it has to be this way Eveline. Remember knowledge is power and in the brotherhood, we keep it close to us.
I just dont feel its right to spoil the market, if you know what I mean, not especially when some people up stairs try so hard to keep it that way.
Once I get my money – we will talk about nation building. Trust me Eveline.
SD
The meters are a no brainer – I can even get a bunch of kids who regularly work in a garage or a room where clothes go to die and even come up with a prototype and I guarantee you, it will be so reliable that you have no idea how simple it is to set up the whole operation.
Go and find out how are the directors of the people selling the californian state those new meters? Go Eveline.
They’re are brotherhood.
SD
Not to mention you need to set up the backend to cater to such metering. That costs money too and guess who will pay for this? – Eveline (#50)
Shouldn’t the government be investing and co-owning these infrastructure components? Companies come and go, but the government is here to stay.
“Shouldn’t the government be investing and co-owning these infrastructure components? Companies come and go, but the government is here to stay.”
Well since we’re a long way away nobody knows what the future full retail contestability model is. So all we have here is conjecture.
Wow! Cheap and good meters! And one that complies with all the codes and regulations etc! I’m sure the EMA would like to talk to you :)
“Listen eveline, if you could persuade your bosses to give me some money for a tank of gas to go to Russia to start my business”
If you can’t even afford a tank of gas yourself…
Please don’t blame them, they claim that they are only the lorry drivers!
aiyoyo
lorry drivers they claimed??
so good pay package as lorry drivers, should we change job scope huh??
where the ELITEs huh??
need them help commoners out, in times like this leh!
economy so slow, gloomy liao…
aiyoyo
I’m sure that their SGD 1Bill+ profit can easily cover the cost of meter installation and etc.
However, that will make the actual usage data from every household available, and it will weaken their ability to obfuscate bills.
So… to make things fairer and more affordable to customers or to line the pockets of a few people?
Tough decision. Tough decision indeed… (sarcasm, for those who don’t get it)
Hmm, usage data has always been available for you to check. It’s called a ELECTRICITY METER and every household has one outside your door.
If you don’t believe the SP bill readings, you can:
a) countercheck with the readings on your meter;
b) ask SP to check if you believe the meter readings are not accurate;
c) ask SP to investigate if you think somebody has been stealing your electricity.
Your meter is read every 2 months. If the tariff changes in between, there will be some adjustment done using daily consumption average (details on SP Services website). If you hate this bi-monthly meter reading thing, you can also submit your readings online or by mail.
QED.
“If the tariff changes in between, there will be some adjustment done using daily consumption average (details on SP Services website).”
Eveline have you ever tried to access the SP services website and do a conversion on tariff /consumption average? Well I have. Bear in mind, we are talking abt a moving average here. So it is really not so different from the math that is required to land the space shuttle.
So how do you expect ordinary folk to make those sort of calculations – can you pls tell me? I really want to know.
You know as a tax payer and a loyal customer of SP. I have just given you free consultancy that would probably have cost hundreds of thousands, if you went to the Boston consulting grp. But what do you do with my valued advise instead?
You start to mount a defence of mechanical meters, candle sticks and horse drawn carriages / and to justify no end why we all SHOULD make do with paying through our noses to retain a fat layer of meter readers, when I have just given you a list of reasons why we dont. Along with why, we should all not complain too much as we have never had it so good.
Eveline you are making me very suspicious now. I am now even starting to wonder whether it may not be such a bad idea to pack up SP and ship everyone to the Russian front and mothball it somewhere in the Smithsonian instutitute, next to the dodo bird exhibit.
SD
I’m quite intrigued by your posts. I’ve read your posts a few times and other than implying that you have some great idea up your sleeve that will save us all or that the entire electricity industry should all be shipped to Siberia, I am hearing nothing else from you.
As for me, I have no personal interest in defending the current system; whatever the system is, I just go along with it and do my job. Neither am I defending how things are done. What I’m hearing are complaints, complaints, complaints so I provide what I think are accurate information and solutions on hand.
As for the MA thing please provide an actual problem. I certainly had no problems understanding the SP Services website but I guess I’m not understanding the issue here.
Good Afternoon,
Lets not complicate things Eveline bc I dont want your head to explode, just try to imagine if you can – flying a 747 from A to B with a blindfold and you’re get a rough idea of what I mean; when I say, it is impossible to manage electricity without a real time feed back loop i.e smart meters.
One of the reasons why it’s so difficult for manufacturing to take off in Singapore is because no one has come up with a way of how to effectively manage electricity; and one reason why they don’t have a clue is bc folk in SP have not been doing a good job of looking into this area as a matter of strategic priority, like I said, if I was head of state, I pack them off to the Russian front pronto i.e providing end-users with an effective way to monitor electricity consumption in real time so that they can better manage it on a long term basis.
Now why are smart meters so important to the whole solution package? Simple, if you don’t have smart meters; then its impossible to even talk about variable pricing; why? Because if you think abt it, variable pricing is just like tampon management 101, it’s exponential smoothing, that’s all it is i.e being able to identify your heavy and light days; that if you notice, is one reason why SP doesn’t even have ANY clue how to even go about structuring such a complex return on investment model; the fact, remains it’s not that they don’t want to do it; As Dick Lee said in Singapore Idol, “you only think, you can do all these things, but you cannot.” Bc what we are talking about is not only MA, it’s the entire gamut of predictive tools which are typically deployed if you want to manage something on a predictive basis e.g exponential curving / predictive softwaring etc.
All this cannot be done in the absence of real time data – so what we are in effect talking abt is not so much smart metering; as a once in a lifetime opportunity it affords us to effectively manage energy as a resource.
As I said, I do not work for free. I want money to go to Russia and start a business. I believe, you people don’t have the brains to go around this; I do. So get the money ready and I promise you, I’ve be there with my bicycle team. Otherwise, this has to be my final post on this issue.
Tq
SD
Dude, real-time metering doesn’t need to occur at every account level. I’m sure you know the system operator operates using real-time data. So we do have real-time data; we just don’t have real-time data at the account level. Of course the question is what’s the value of having account-level real-time data.
You are right – TOD metering is one key to providing more sophisticated pricing packages (which is why it is one of the key issues for retail contestability). The question is the returns. Singapore is not Russia and we don’t have the four seasons. For the normal household you’re not going to be seeing variable swings of energy consumption through the year. Even day and night loads don’t differ much. How much “managing” are you going to achieve here?
If you’re talking about a TOD meter just for managing energy consumption at household level, consider the materiality. How much are you going to help a household save? All a family needs to do is to check the ratings of your appliances. Everybody knows the aircon is a big consumer of energy; you don’t need to install a TOD meter to tell you that.
For the industrial users yes, there is the materiality and most of them by now do already have TOD meters.
I’m not even going to talk about the politics of the whole issue, which I suspect is behind your veil jibes. Yes these issues exist, and perhaps that’s why things are not progressing as fast as some of us would like them to.
You sound like you know what to do but talking big here is not going to cut it. If you are looking for a business, a forum like this is not the place to do it.
Good Morning Eveline,
“Everybody knows the aircon is a big consumer of energy; you don’t need to install a TOD meter to tell you that.”
Is that true? Yes, it is GENERALLY at least, but if the goal is efficiency, then without TOD metering, you would never be able to determine your parameters of usage against demand effectively at any given point in time – that means SPECIFICALLY, that statement is wrong – bc I can very well argue if you cant even tell me what is your KW consumption on lets say 3.00pm / on the 5th floor of Suntec City on a Sunday – your chances of managing anything is a big fat zero.
Now if you notice, that is why power producers like to talk in terms of TWh (Terrawats) – you know why, bc that’s a big unit of measurement and without smart meters the cant really narrow down their field of analysis to even talk very much about the small picture. Is it such a wonder SP doesn’t want to talk about variable pricing – truth remains, THEY CANNOT EVEN TALK ABOUT IT WITHOUT FIRST HAVING SMART METERS.
Next, why is it so important to capture the small picture of electricity usage? Bc what it means is a reversal of what you have just said i.e everybody knows the aircon is a big consumer of energy. That’s like saying all cars burn fossil fuels, but it really doesn’t tell you how far you’re going to go lets say if you put one tank of gas into a Honda fit, lets say – so the issue isn’t GENERALITY as much as it remains a very SPECIFIC question.
Let me give you an illustration of this paradox:
Now if you go to Byzantine library in Bugis that looks abit like the Aga foundation HQ – what do you actually see? A very big building where maybe books go to die and folk go for an afternoon snooze, but just look at how those dummies are managing their air-con resources there?
How much square footage are they cooling down to an ambient of 25° centigrade? How does that compare with the amount of traffic being served? Tell me what’s the point of cooling down a foyer the size of two basket courts when all you have is maybe 2 people passing through there every 60 minutes?
Now my point is WIHTOUT computer metering you will never ever know whether you are managing resources wisely; bc you don’t even have the options to incorporate sensors to determine how you might actually be making efficient use of your air-con resources in a building, factory or even a cluster of fixed assets. Now if you notice, in annual reports of most public listed firms in the hospitality industry. NONE of them supply you specific breakdowns on how they use electricity, usually its treated as a fixed cost / overhead i.e All costs incurred during the manufacturing costs other than the costs of raw materials and inputs are classified as manufacturing costs. These costs include salaries and other benefits paid to production staff, cost of electricity, water etc
Go Eveline. Do yourself a favor and go find out what’s the best practices in the manufacturing sector in this area. So if you want to talk about “materiality,” you cant just look at the initial capital investment in TOD meters and discount wholesale the cost savings which you would have gained in the opportunity cost that it will provide you with.
But let’s cut to the chase, to make all this turn, you need brain power, loads of it– without it, all these goodies will simply be ALL TALK NO ACTION.
We have many models which we can share with you all to improve not only electricity, but also transportation and its all based on linear programming modeling that leverages on variable pricing, but as I said, it all starts with buying into smart metering and of course my plastic bag of money so that I can haul my ass to Russia.
Put it NTUC plastic bags – they’re good, small notes, I don’t want the income tax shop coming after me.
SD
“You sound like you know what to do but talking big here is not going to cut it. If you are looking for a business, a forum like this is not the place to do it.”
Well spotted Eveline. Bc this is PRECISELY the type of rubber meets the road questions that I expect, ministers and MP’s such as Ah Baey to ask during question time in Parliament. Instead of wasting ALL our time and money pursuing pie in the sky gay rights which frankly speaking no one really cares about.
Think abt it, if the price of electricity sky rockets 20 some percent, do you think, I really care what two consenting adults decide to do behind a bush? Dont care.
And let me tell you another thing, this is PRECISELY, the type of questions that I expect the best the world ST to write about – but what do they do instead? They give us all soundbites and doggy biscuits instead.
So now you have just answered the very question you posed to me. If this people did their job of gainfully. Maybe I wouldnt have to ask all these questions which should be asked.
SD
63) Eveline on December 13th, 2008 8.29 am
“Everybody knows the aircon is a big consumer of energy; you don’t need to install a TOD meter to tell you that.”
Ya la, just cut the electricity rate lah as long as you know there is a lot of fat in between.
Some of us know that you know that a lot of us know that they know what they are doing are just a way to squeeze juice out of us lah.
I dunno. How to cut the fat leh? You tell me.
If you’re talking about energy efficiency, I have a very short answer for you:
Before the meter: SP responsibility; after the meter: customer responsibility.
The longer answer (and trite, I know, but that’s the way it is here and that’s why TOD meter is not relevant in this case) is that if customers want to know how much Xth floor is consuming at this time, it’s the customer’s responsibility and not SP to install monitoring devices.
It also depends on how the metering is done within the building itself. If the meter is not wired such that you can measure the consumption floor by floor, replacing a mechanical meter with a TOD meter is not going to help.
Then you have this master-sub metering scheme which makes my head hurt just thinking about it.
And then you want to talk about the market clearing engine side of things. Now we’re talking big. Don’t do it on this forum; you know where to go if you have want it takes.
Is the current system ideal? There’s probably lots of area of improvement. Now the question is how much it takes to overhaul the entire system itself and whether it’s even wise to do so.
Which is why the electricity industry is waiting with bated breath to see what EMA will do to push full retail contestability forward.
68) Eveline on December 13th, 2008 1.42 pm
Go to NTUC and buy a paring knife. I think this will do the job.
If the fat is hard, then I suggest chopper (NTUC should have this).
Fat that is hard like a piece of rock, perhaps you need to call in our Home Team from the demolition side. Search the internet if this is still not helpful. phew at last !!!!
Good Afternoon,
“Before the meter: SP responsibility; after the meter: customer responsibility.”
I am sorry, but I’ve have got news for you Eveline. I disagree with you most vehemently / that is PRECISELY the sort of pass-the-buck-to-the-customer attitude that I strongly suspect accounts for why so many of us have to REGULARLY put up with unreasonable price and tax hikes cum mediocre services in healthcare, tc’s and how the public sector generally goes about the business of accounting for their actions and policies.
Now please correct me if I am wrong, are we talking about the power grid in Timbuktu or Singapore? Bc I may be under a misapprehension here. If it is the former, then I say, I don’t have any issue with what you just said here:
““Before the meter: SP responsibility; after the meter: customer responsibility.”
If it is the former, then based on what I’ve been regularly sold by the press 24/7, I expect a 1st division response on this matter and that simply means, what you have offered by way of an explanation is simply NOT acceptable and nothing close to the QUALITY that most consumers can even expect.
Neither does your suggested solution of purchasing and operating intelligent metering make any sense either, since there is no way to leverage of cost competitiveness which would usually come about from the economies of scale; if this project is implemented on a precinct or country wide basis. So you jolly well know that what you are suggesting doesn’t even make on ounce of common sense.
I have cc all the entire comments of this thread to the ASDF and you will be pleased to know that a team is currently being assembled to look seriously into the whole issue of price contestability by EMA.
I believe a central thrust of this report will also contain a comprehensive business plan to propose variable pricing and a pilot scheme to test out the feasibility of implementing computerized metering.
Why have we done this Eveline? Bc when the serious people sit down and read our report and compare it with what has been prepared by these deadenders; they will invariably ask themselves sooner or later; “why didn’t the people who are running the show write this report? Isn’t that supposed to their job? Why aren’t they playing the 1st division game like they should?”
You see the way I figure it out; even in the oligarchy of elites; they are serious men who may sometimes even be more serious than the serious men themselves; and when this people see the gap between performance and quality; they will respond very much like Darkness used too and just wave their hands and say,
“This people have failed us, send them all to the Russian front!”
And when all these complacent deadenders are dragged off into some flying saucer, they all replied,
““Before the meter: SP responsibility; after the meter: customer responsibility.”
Eveline, you have no idea how lucky you are that PAP is running this country…no idea……how could you?…no idea what so ever.
SD
And let me tell you something else, if SMRT is dumb enough to approve glass partitions on open air platforms and pass on the charges to me as the end user.
I may just decide to drop the ASDF a line and ask them to do a feasebility study on variable pricing for public transportation as well.
I am sick and tired of being a victim of this pass-the-buck-to-the-customer attitude and I dont see ANY reason why people who regularly claim to be “the best in the world” – “1st division” should even be allowed to hide behind pastry thin excuses, let alone mediocrity – dont say, I’ve been political here.
I am not. I never came out to the world and told everyone that I am the best, you all started that game. I just played it.
SD
Neither did I. I merely stated what the current status is. I’ve never said we have the best market in world; in fact I stated clearly that we could probably improve it.
And I am surprised by your surprise. If you are really the expert you paint yourself to be then you should not be. I look forward to your fictional report; if it’s going to contain anything from this thread it’s probably not worth reading.
Have fun.
Eveline.
I disagree with your assesment of the status quo ante Eveline. As I stated I believe very strongly both SP and EMA are complacent and bovine. I stand by my statement and this does not in any way prejudice their legal rights in the laws of Singapore – in their ongoing efforts to find ways to deliver value to their customer base. I have every reason to believe, they have failed miserably in this regard, in the recent electricity tarif hikes.
As I said, I believe that we should all work towards an agreement that we FIRST need to eliminate the army of meter readers (and probably shut down SP and sack everyone there, bc I really do not know what their role is in the supply chain of value / can you pls tell me, bc all they seem to be doing is putting on their postman Pat hat on and playing some glorified postman role of passing-the-buck-to-the-customer / as I have mentioned, this is UNACCEPTABLE) which is currently contributing to the very high cost of electricity – SECONDLY, I believe there should be an agreement in principle, the way to move forward is by seriously considering augmenting the current deficits in management by phasing in computerized metering – and THIRDLY, this should be concurrently complimented with variable pricing.
None of these things which I have mentioned has been done or even considered on a feasebility basis – so all I am asking is why not?
As a tax payer, I have a right to ask pertinent questions and on record, I would have you know Eveline, that I am yet to receive a valid answer that satisfies me completely.
So try to put yourself in my position – if I have every reason to believe, I am dealing with a bunch of incompetent people here – what do you expect me to do?- except maybe to outsource it to the ASDF to answer these questions which should ideally be addressed by both SP and EMA?
You decide, what is fictitous and worth or is not worth reading, just remember, I have copied this entire thread commentary and it will be read by every single one in the Brotherhood Press.
Good Evening, do try to have a nice weekend ahead. Remember we have the second highest tarrif in the entire world! I wonder why?
SD
First and foremost, you can begin by stop misrepresenting my position. I have stated at least twice that I think the current system has room for improvement. In my first post in this thread I have also alluded to the passing-the-buck mentality. So no I am not blind to the short-comings we are dealing with.
The context however goes beyond mere technological solution. I’m also not in the habit of providing free information to strangers so if you are doing what you claim you are, I’m sure you’ll find them out soon enough.
Don’t worry, as far as I know the EMA is not interested in suing people, not least anonymous posters on forums like this. “On record” on this thread is meaningless if every poster on this thread is using only nicks.
Singapore has the second highest electricity tariff in the world! No shit! Source please.
Eveline,
“On record” on this thread is meaningless if every poster on this thread is using only nicks.”
OK Eveline, you win. Providing I can get money. I’ve be more than happy to put on my leather underwear and get into my Zegna Italian suit, slick back my hair and all of us will get into a V8 jaguar and make our way to any location of your choice and I’ve even throw in a few eye candies like Darkness (how’s that) to spice up the whole event so that you can tell your grand children abt it – a one hour obligation free presentation on how to save us all from the ravages of rising oil prices .
It will be very smooth Eveline, so smooth and slick that when we make the first move and slide in, your bosses will hardly even notice it; as if we’re all covered from head to toe in vaseline – trust me, we have done this many times bfr for many people, no questions, 100% anonymity guarantee and the assurance of a silence.
There is no shame Eveline, if you ppl do not know how to turn the wheel of life – why suffer in silence? We dont understand. Really, we do not. There is no need. History has shown you can buy into a well regulated mercenary market to fulfill every aspect of your aspirations.
Makes no sense when you can go with the flow, think about it – it will be smooth, very smooth.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XS6FnaI6f5E&feature=related
SD
When a state/company had monopolised all the essential ( electric, water , gas )of life without any competition, there is no incentives to lower the cost. Put it simply, profit is the motive, there is no desire to provide “welfare” but operate the companies as a private concern. This is true also with the running of the country. PAP is the government and through the government all these companies are managed with a simple motive of generating as high a profit as possible. If a family cannot affort to pay, they just disconnect the supplies and the poor family had to fine more money to have it reconnected- making a bad situation worst. The problem is not with the utilities companies but with the gahment. The commercial environment took the lead from the gahment and the change will come only after there is a change on the political front. The link is there but may not be visible to many Sinkaporean.