Glendale Water and Power has organized a Smart Energy Community Forum to present its case for the Smart Grid project. The letter announcing the forum states that it will “feature local, statewide and national panelists who have expertise in addressing the key consumer issues and concerns that have surfaced in the industry.”
In a letter responding to this invitation, and at city council chambers, I noted that panelists could be described in a different way: all except one have a direct conflict of interest, because their research program, their career, or their sales bottom line includes smart meter technology and programs. It is more than likely that customers attending will get another sales pitch for the grand program.
Objections to smart meters and the smart grid include: unknown health effects of constant exposure to wireless, pulsed, digital radiation the devices emit; and violations of privacy because meters collect energy use information several times a day and transmit it back to the utility.
A forum focusing on the significant downsides of smart meters took place last week in Glendale and drew concerned citizens from around Southern California. Ron Kaye wrote about The Arrogance of Power in Sunday’s Glendale News-Press (taking a line from one irate GWP customer), concluding “Listening to members of the audience comment at the end of the program, I came away convinced that there are legitimate questions to be answered and we need a much more robust — and honest — conversation about smart meters and just about everything else that people in authority are imposing on us.” The November 10 forum was also covered in LA Weekly’s Smart Meter Resistance Spreads to SoCal, which advised LADWP customers to “join the zealots at your city’s next council meeting and urge local politicians to do like many NorCal jurisdictions have done already: Pass a moratorium on Smart Meters. At least until they’re proven safe, effective and a little less creepy.”
Selling this project in the face of growing opposition in Glendale, around the state, and around the country continues to be the focus for GWP: two years of community outreach meetings, this year’s weekend “Coffees in the Park”, and now a forum with several heavy hitters in the project, including a representative from the California Public Utilities Commission who claimed in an email to a Burbank resident that “the CPUC has zero authority over municipal utilities.” That claim is actually not true: the CPUC does have authority over municipal utilities when it comes to public safety issues, and those concerned about the long-term impacts of constant exposure to EMFs would certainly classify their worries as a public safety issue.
The CPUC is now sorting out proposals to allow opt-outs for the thousands of customers throughout California who don’t want smart meters. Many opposed to smart meters are asking: “Why should those who don’t want smart meters have to pay extra to opt out?” At the September 14 hearing on opt-outs, an official told the audience that since the CPUC authorized the project, either ratepayers or taxpayers are on the hook for opt-out costs. One member of the audience asked, “Why shouldn’t shareholders bear the cost?” That’s a question that PG&E, SCE, and SDG&E customers can sort out. Where does that leave citizens served by a municipal utility?
The fact is that utilities didn’t have the right to install these meters on people’s residences without their consent.
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SMART METERS ARE ONLY GOOD FOR UTILITY COMPANY EXECUTIVES
Concepts and theory sounds great, but upon closer inspection:
A. Utility bills are increasing where smart meters are installed, not decreasing.
B. Customer information from smart meters is NOT formatted for customers and does NOT change customer behavior towards conservation.
C. Increased utility rates may decrease energy usage, but that can be done with inexpensive time-of-use meters, NOT requiring expensive smart meters.
D. The cost – benefit of smart meters is horrendous and is being promoted to profit the utility companies and their suppliers, not customers or our society or our environment.
E. The Smart Grid does NOT use or require a smart meter on each home. The necessary smart information can be gathered much more efficiently and timely and inexpensively at energy distribution points. (The smart grid does not care how much power any one home uses.)
F. The vast amount of unnecessary and nearly useless information to be handled and stored may actually end up raising energy usage.
G. This massive Billions-of-dollars smart meter program will leave NO funds for programs that would truly bring energy saving solutions and the public will not be receptive to real solutions after being burned by these Smart meters.
SMART METER PRIVACY VIOLATIONS.
1. Must-See 4-minute youtube video on Smart meters
? http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=8JNFr_j6kdI
CUSTOMER UTILITY BILLS AFTER SMART METERS INSTALLED.
2. Skyrocketing Utility Bills after installation
TV News Video (3 minutes)
http://www.bakersfieldnow.com/news/63581287.html?tab=video
3. Systemic Smart Meter Billing Errors Over 200% Uncovered in Australia
TV News Video (7 minutes)
http://au.news.yahoo.com/today-tonight/money/article/-/10241945/power-scandal-exposed/ – video
NATIONAL SECURITY RISKS DUE TO SMART METERS.
4. CIA Director James Woolsey calls Smart grid “Stupid” due to National Security problems caused by so-called smart meters.
News Video (1 minute)
http://www.energynow.com/video/2011/08/10/preview-mix-james-woolsey
RADIATION.
5. RADIATION MEASURED FROM SMART METER MOUNTED ON A HOME (once active in the utility system) SHOWS RADIATION TRANSMISSION PULSES APPROXIMATELY ONCE EVERY FOUR SECONDS 24 HOURS PER DAY traveling through the bodies and brains of the inhabitants of that home. Youtube Video (6 minutes, 1st minute is sufficient)
?http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uRejDxBE6OE
PG$E, California’s Utility Monopoly, recently admitted that each smart meter mounted on a home transmits radiation between 10,000 and 190,000 times each day.
This admission corrected previous false statements repeated often by many utility companies across the country.
I noted that panelists could be described in a different way: all except one have a direct conflict of interest, because their research program, their career, or their sales bottom line includes smart meter technology and programs. It is more than likely that customers attending will get another sales pitch for the grand program.
So, Cindy Sage and Orlean Koehle aren’t selling their/seeking grants research or peddling books respectively?
I’m not a believer in Orlean Koehle’s Agenda 21, United Nations theory, but she did say at the forum that she published the book on Smart Meters without a copyright–and people can download it for free.
Likewise, Cindy Sage’s Bioinitiative Report and her study on Smart Meters as well as many videos are available for free on the Internet.
There is so much money on the other side and I think there has been such a spigot of grants and funds unleashed (as well as approval for rate hikes) that it doesn’t matter what they’re installing (a cheap wireless system which is a health hazard and is extremely vulnerable to cyber attack)–the money’s flowing. The city where I live, Irvine, got an additional 40 million dollars in grants to make our city a “living laboratory” for the Smart Grid.
Most of us concerned about this are digging into our own pockets to print flyers and sometimes our feet are sore from walking to raise public awareness when there has been such a media blackout (in Orange Country, especially) that people don’t even know what Edison has installed on the side of their house.
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