Smart Meters

They'll give us cancer, claim MA smart meter opponents

Aug 15, 2012

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Quick Take: Another scare-tactics group has arisen, this time in Massachusetts, where an organization called "Halt MA Smart Meters" is hosting a website and issuing press releases. The group claims that the "meters use pulsed, wireless (cellular), high frequency communication, a recently recognized carcinogen."

We have two suggestions for utilities. First, create an opt-out program for those few customers who are immune to logic and reason. Second, take a look at the consumer-oriented smart meter materials just released by the Smart Grid Consumer Collaborative. Borrow them (or build your own if you prefer) and then immediately begin an outreach program to tell the truth about smart meters. Be proactive. Don't wait for a problem to surface in your service territory. - By Jesse Berst

Smart grid, smart grid technologies, smart meters, advanced meters, smart meter opponents, smart meter backlash, electric utilities

Groups of smart meter opponents in the Boston area are uniting and affiliating themselves with other anti-smart meter groups in Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont to oppose meter deployments, according to a press release from the group Halt MA Smart Meters.

The group is claiming that the wireless communications systems smart meters use to transmit data are sending radio frequency radiation into their homes and surroundings that were recently found to be carcinogenic.

The group also contends that utilities are misleading customers about smart meters. "The utility companies, including NStar and National Grid, are misleading consumers about the meters that are actually on their homes, claiming they are being read by meter readers when they are in fact transmitting wirelessly. Additionally, these meters can reveal when customers are home or away, and what appliances they have purchased, as well as many other personal homeowner habits which may be turned over to 3rd parties (such as Comcast) for marketing purposes."

The Halt MA Smart Meters group describes itself as a statewide organization "against wireless and Smart Meters," and say they are joining forces and "pushing back on this poorly designed and dangerous initiative."

Jesse Berst is the founder and chief analyst of Smart Grid News.com, the industry's oldest and largest smart grid site. A frequent keynoter at industry events in the U.S. and abroad, he also serves on advisory committees for Pacific Northwest National Laboratory and the Institute for Electric Efficiency. He often provides strategic consulting to large corporations and venture-backed startups. He is a member of the advisory boards of GridGlo and Calico Energy Services.

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Misinformation and Ignorance are Great Impediments

I am in favor of smart meters using RF for communications. I have read of similar cases in other parts of the country where people have banded together to prohibit the use of such technology. My concern about how to counter this, as described in the article, is when a fearful person is given a huge study by a group supportive of such technology, they often dismiss it as biased. One argument I use is to make a simple correlation to existing cellular phones. When the phone is not stuck to your head, there has been no indication of increased cancer risk. Whether a person owns a cell phone or not, as we know, they are constantly bombarded by higher powered RF waves from multiple carriers--higher power than the RF power proposed by smart metering vendors. If they are fearful of low powered 902-928 MHz mesh RF, they should be very fearful of all the carrier waves (which they should not be, of course).

Tony Burge - 08/15/2012 - 06:57

MA Smart Meter Opponents

Utilities rely on the FCC that RF is safe. However, no long term study has been done for Nest type RF by the FCC. (Reminds me of no long term studies on cigarettes. Look at what has now happened after decades of companies denying any problems to humans!). It is true that the body is an electrical organism. We are going willy-nilly into huge RF generation without knowing the consequences. There is no good science here. Inquiring minds have to ask Why?

Paul Verchinski - 08/15/2012 - 07:40

RE:Quick Take

I agree that the two suggestions to the utilities in the quick take are spot on. Educate first, create a opt out that isn't heavy handed and then begin the deployment.

Yes the human body is an "electrical organism" but our bodies are also generally adapt to low level RF signals from many sources. If our bodies could not handle the low rf - we would have MANY people getting sick EVERY time a thunderstorm passed through. A lightning strike generates a tremendous broad spectrum rf signal! Lightning strikes are a constant - yet the human race survives. In general the energy from a rf point source drops down with the square of the distance. So yes a cellphone next to the brain could be bad. But we are not likely to carry our smart meters on our bodies or place them 1/2 inch from our heads.

As for the rf studies - they go both ways. The FCC really doesn't do the indepth safety studies, then really never have and they probably wouldn't in the future. Their primary mission is spectrum management, allocation and planning (I know over simplified -- point is don't expect deep detailed tissue studies from the FCC.)

As for fears of being bombarded by energy from smart meters - an observation that needs to be made is that many of us have had AMR (automatic meter reading) installed for years. We haven't gone blind, had body parts fall off, or glow in the dark.

Much of the fight over smart meters - is simply lack of explanation, education on how they are used and push back from the consumers on what is viewed has a heavy handed implementation.

Dennis Heidner - 08/15/2012 - 13:51

Smart Meters

Time to smarten up about smart meters, folks. They are not safe and that has been known for decades, especially by those who raised cattle (see Sam Milham, MD, MPH http://electromagnetichealth.org/electromagnetic-health-blog/sam-milham/. Their frequencies vibrate our cells and rearrange the DNA.

“1. Pulsed microwave emissions from the smart meter are absorbed by water.

2. The normal brain is almost 80% water.

3. The brain is stimulated by electricity and magnets.

4. We use a method called Hertz (Hz) to measure brain activity.

5. The smart meter sends full body pulses using electromagnetics oscillating at 900 million times per second or 900MHz.

6. When we are sleeping our brain is operating between .1 and 4Hz

7. Smart meter emissions use the energized wiring in your home as a highway, riding on a 3 foot plume.

8. The smart meter is actively communicating every 4 hours, but "chatters" throughout the day.”

Watch “The Inner Life of a Cell,” http://www.xvivo.net/the-inner-life-of-the-cell/, a brief graphic animation of a white blood cell’s’activities, illustrates the fragility of the environment existing within each of our cells.

All lifeforms are being bathed in electromagnetic and radio frequencies that interfere with our own "natural" frequencies. Check out how many cell towers and antennas are in your neighborhood www.antennasearch.com

Nancy Baer - 08/15/2012 - 14:35

Other RF

I also am interested in why relatively low-powered RF smart meters are being targeted. If that is truly a concern, then shouldn't the following also be of concern: cellular, AM/FM radio, and GPS satellite transmission?

Tony Burge - 08/16/2012 - 06:44

Asking the right quesiton!

Debating if there could possibly be a long term health risk form a radio attached to yoru house that transmits at < 1W for less than 20 seconds per day can be entertaining, but ultimately we only convince the converted. Tony is asking the right question: Why is the radio in the meter so much of a concern? Because the industry has not done a good job of making them desireable. No, we've done a GREAT job of making it out to be an instrumetn of control and forced change upon the consumer.

People don't worry about harmful emissions of EMR fro the cell phone, the TV remote, The 1200W 2.4GHz Microwave Oven (!), or the large labrador sitting by your feet while you watch TV. All of those things provide recognizable, desireable value to the consumer. The meter has not been presented to the consumer in a positive way.

A lot of people don't like the thought of someone at the utility or the government contorlling their stuff, or even knowing what stuff they have and how they use it. It's not just the foil-hat crowd, anti-smart meter folks include otehrwise reasonable people who fear loss of control and forced lifestyle changes.

If we really want the problem to be solved, we need to explain the technology in ways that make the consumer want it.

Benjamin A. Rolfe - 08/16/2012 - 14:34

Smart Meter Dangers

In a free society, nobody has the right to tell other competent adults how they should live their lives or perceive their world. Smart Meters is a DUMB technology on many fronts, and I can take on any of you VESTED INTEREST Industry Wizards at the drop of a hat. Now regarding the RF Radiation dangers no matter how low level it may be, interested parties are welcome to get an education here. http://microondes.wordpress.com/2010/04/17/robert-c-kane-cellular-telephone-russian-roulette/

And please keep the smart meters away from me, and we can all be friends.

George Karadimas - 08/24/2012 - 20:09

'Make the consumer want it??'

To Mr. Rolfe, on your comment 'need to explain in ways that make the consumer want it'. Excuse me, but who in the hell do you think you are? Listen to yourself for God's sake. Your mentality and sick 'logic' is conceptually no different than the mentality of a rapist. NO human being has a right to try to 'MAKE' another human being 'want' something. Have you quit beating your wife yet?

People like you, and people who think like you, are the PROBLEM, not the solution.

SueAnn West - 08/25/2012 - 18:42

'immune to logic and reason??'

To author Jesse Burst: 'Immune to logic and reason??' I have one suggestion for you, you arrogant twit. Try to find a vaccine that will cure your obvious immunity to brain cells. I am a cancer survivor. I want to STAY that way. I don't need BRAIN-DEAD IDIOTS like you sitting up nights thinking of ways to FORCE an untested technology upon me. I also spent a 30 year career developing new technology, and never once had to FORCE it upon people. Only IDIOTS would do such a thing. I had enough brain cells to tell that if they didn't WANT it, then something was WRONG with it....DUH !!!

SueAnn West - 08/25/2012 - 19:09

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