Turning off power – In October we ran a story about Duke Energy turning off an Ohio woman's power because she didn't want a smart meter on her home for health reasons. So we asked: In states with no opt-out policy, should utilities disconnect customers who don't want smart meters? Hundreds of readers responded, with the majority (59%) voting no, 36% said yes and 5% weren't sure. As you might imagine, we also got a lot of Talk Back on this story.

Cisco's smart grid future – It was almost a year ago that we wrote about Cisco's grand framework -- the reference architecture it calls GridBlocks – as a potential game-changer that merits careful study by utilities. And we asked readers to characterize the Cisco Connected Grid plan in a quick poll. The vote was very close, with 38% labeling it "interesting but not earthshaking," 30% calling it "an important industry milestone" – and 32% voted "yawn."

Wind PTC – The fate of a Congressional extension of production tax credits (PTCs) was a hot topic all year long. In October we ran a story about heavyweight support growing for the wind PTC. We also asked readers if they wanted to see Congress extend it. The numbers were pretty lopsided, with 61% voting yes, 31% saying no and 5% undecided.

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