Editor, The Times:

Re: BC Hydro Smart Meter Costs

The $1 billion BC Hydro has already spent installing smart meters by no means reflects the final cost.

Experienced people estimate that it will cost as much again to complete the grid throughout the province.

Impulses travel from meter to meter to meter to, eventually, a collection pole. Simple enough in urban areas with houses close together – a horrendous expense in rural areas where homes are far apart, driveways may be from 1/4 to 1/2 mile long and there are no central areas for meters to transmit to. Receivers will have to be put in along these driveways and roads and main collection poles provided.

Over half of B.C. is rural. Shouldn’t someone have done the math?

Even in urban areas the grid isn’t complete. Yet BC Hydro meter readers received notice their jobs will end March 31, 2013. Who will read the meters April 1?

Trudy Frisk

Kamloops, B.C.