SMART METERS WILL NAB ELECTRICITY THIEVES

To the editor:

Re: "Letter of the week," Dec. 21.

More than $100 million worth of electricity is stolen from BC Hydro
every year, much of it stolen to power marijuana grow ops. As an
honest BC Hydro customer, I'm unhappy to know that people are
stealing electricity. I'm even more unhappy to know that the cost of
all that stolen electricity gets added to the hydro bills of honest
customers like you and me. That's why I'm glad BC Hydro is installing
smart meters. Smart meters will let BC Hydro zero in on electricity
theft quickly and accurately and shut down the perpetrators. The old
mechanical meters BC Hydro has relied on since the 1940s and 1950s
can't do that. All they do is measure how much electricity has gone
through them, and they only get checked manually every couple of
months (long after the opportunity to catch electricity thieves has passed).

Mike Taylor, Port Moody