There's a bunch of experts at reading pulses and other stuff from a meter over at http://openenergymonitor.org that you can consult with on this. Also, if you use software serial in its latest incarnation, you can read reverse signals on the serial input. This allows you to use the regular serial as a monitor or command port. The page for it is at AltSoftSerial Library, for an extra serial port I haven't used it with signal inversion, so you'll have to take a look at the library to see how to set it up for this. More info on this at NewSoftSerial | Arduiniana
I tried reading my meter which gives out red (can you believe it) pulses. I was getting terrible interference from ambient light and had to get some modeling clay and mash it all over the sensor and about an inch out to the side. This gave me enough signal to reliably count pulses, but the clay melted in the sun and I haven't gone back to the project to see what is better to do. Took about an hour to clean up the melted clay from the meter and the concrete under it. There are lots of silicon based solutions that I could have used, but I happened to have some dark blue clay..... When you get that far along, google oogoo for a material that works really well for stuff like this, you can even tint it to the color you need.