Are smart meters bad for your health?
Say what?
If you are like me and have had a smart electric meter installed (as well as a smart thermostat) by your local utility (in my case Austin Energy) you might have felt that you were doing your bit to help utilities became more efficient and give yourself more control over your energy usage.
For the uninitiated, smart meters are automated meters with a wireless transmitter which record power consumption in intervals of an hour or less and communicates that information to the local utility at regular intervals. By monitoring and billing power use in real time, they allow utilities to more efficiently balance supply and demand and charge customers more accurately based on the power they actually use. For their part, customers can read the data and adjust their electricity use to achieve lower bills by using power when rates are lower, and by locating and cutting down on the appliances in their homes that are gobbling up a lot of electricity. For utilities across the country that are looking to conserve energy output as a way to avoid expanding or building additional expensive power plants, and to help reduce carbon emissions in order to meet rigorous federal and state regulations, smart meters are a popular tool. Some 90 million of these devices have been installed worldwide, and tens of millions by electric utilities across the US, including American Electric Power, CenterPoint Energy, Duke Energy, Entergy, and others.
But evidently some Californians have a problem with them.
According to Todd Woody’s excellent energy blog, PG&E has been forced by California state regulators to allow customers to have their smart meters’ radios turned off. There has been a consumer revolt in Northern California, with thousands of citizens claiming that the wireless transmission of data to and from the meters was doing damage to residents’ health, alleging that the low-frequency radio waves cause cancers, migraines, and other illnesses. No definite proof of this link has been scientifically established.
Nevertheless, proponents of this theory have been active and vocal at California Public Utilities Commission sessions. And the Commission has accommodated them.
It is not just a handful of people opting out. The company expects about 150,000 of its 5.1 million customers to pay to have their meters disabled. Opting out of the system will prove costly. PG&E, which began to install smart meters in 2006, expects to charge the average customer who opts out about $600 in one-time charges and monthly fees for disconnecting the radio transmitter.
Smart move for PG&E. Until the unlikely event that science proves the company wrong, the removal of cost-saving meter devices will require customers to pay a premium (to at least cover the cost of implementing the fix and the lost savings the active meters would have provided to the utility) for their customization of a mass-adopted system that has done no harm.
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If you don’t believe that there’s any health risks associated with digitial, wireless smart meters, you should read just a few accounts of how real people have been affected by them (and this is just California, there are others in the USA too):
http://emfsafetynetwork.org/?page_id=2292
This mother of 3 young children contemplated suicide after her regular but intermittent migraines became constant:
http://open.salon.com/blog/show_the_love/2011/03/18/migraines_smart_meters_and_my_new_movie_about_emfs
Please have the wherewithall to realize that these meters are definitely different – no one has ever really lived with an RF transmitting mechanism directly applied to an Alternating Current (AC) within their home that’s definitely generating dirty electricity, which cause some people (3% severly, 35% moderately) to immediately feel ill-health effects:
http://electricalpollution.com/smartmeters.html
Many thinkers who admire the theory of smartmeters don’t want to face the fact that real people in large numbers are having their health and well-being compromised. There is no justification for allowing this, NONE. I have spoken to them, they are real. They could be your mother, sister or wife. In this case, the scientific method was abandoned in the face of money. In California there were no pilot studies of physiological effects, no environmental reports just greed unabated.
The Roman Empire did not have the technology to realize that lead in their pipes was poisoning the citizenry, but we now know it was happening. The “benefits of smartmeters” are still theoretical but the observed suffering is real and well documented. A benevolent government would stop in the face of thousands of negative reports and consider other alternatives in promoting energy efficiency. Science does not always require mortality statistics as part of its proof. A precautionary approach is required. Money does not necessitate brutality!!
@AplJaks and Inside9,
I appreciate your concern about health risks and that people truly believe that the transmitters cause harm. However, it all seems so outside of my experience and the consensus position (90 million smart meters have been installed worldwide) that I need scientific evidence, not personal anaecdote, in order to change my mind. Do people who live near smart meters get sick? Yes. Do smart meters cause that sickness? I am yet to be persuaded.
Stuart – Your logic is terribly flawed. Our government historically and regularly approves foods, products and processes which are later proven to cause harm to the masses. Some of those once SWORN to be “entirely harmless”: nuclear energy, aspartame, saccharin, silicon implants, high fructose corn syrup, DDT, fluoride, mercury, lead, sodium nitrite, hydrogenated oils, Red No. 40, Orange No. 1, Red No. 2, BPA, non-stick pans (PFOA, PFIB), clothianidin…
@Jen,
Your point is well taken.
But ungrounded fear seems like a poor substitute for the sceintific method. After all it was science that proved the problems that you list.
I like facts.
I’ve gotten into many debates with conspiracy theory nuts. Theories ranging from E.T visitors, “Chemtrails”, 2012, End-of-the-world, etc. What I’ve noticed is that all it takes is one good rumor(or theories, as far as they’re concerned) to cause a snowball. They pick out one or two isolated incidents, and then tie it to their theories. Before you know it, you have a group of believers trying to “spread the truth” through blogs, youtube, social networks, books. Problem is..where’s the scientific proof? Nowhere
@ J.M.,
Thanks for your insight. I could not agree more. Anecdote, coincidence, strong feelings, and an active imagination are no substitute for the scientific method.
Stuart,
I was with you on the belief in the smart meters. I also want to start by saying that I have no problem with the technology, and since I work in the utility industry I see the benefits of the meters. That said, I will now tell you my story. I work as a customer care rep in Texas, and received a call from a customer who did not want a smart meter. I advised her that the PUC was requiring them. I was then cussed out and told I was ignorant. I was then told to do some research on “smart meter sickness.” I at first was very skeptical, but looked into it. It said it can cause seizures. I have a 12 yr old son that has been having seizures, and they do not know what was triggering them. His started in 3/2007, and the smart meter on our home at that time began transmitting on 3/12/2007. He had regular seizures until we moved to Dallas. The area we lived in had not had the meters installed yet. He went basically seizure free for 2 years. He had 1 seizure during that time, and that was when we went to visit his grandparents for Thanksgiving. They have a smart meter. He was then seizure free for almost a year and a half. He had a seizure on 06/01/11 at 6:30am, and the smart meter was installed on our home in Dallas on 5/24/11. It began transmitting on 05/31/11. With everything new there are a small group of people that are adversley effected. I am still for the meters, but I will have to find a solution for my son. If we had stopped creating vaccines when some had reactions to them where would we be? We just need to work on solutions for the people who are hyper sensitive to these type things.
@Steph,
I am sorry to hear about your son’s condition. I agree wholeheartedly with your analysis. There are rare individuals who experience mysterious medical conditions that can stump the smartest doctors. I am not going to deny the connection between radio waves and your son’s health. Good luck in your search for a solution.
It would be prudent to have a physician’s note stating that an opt-out patient might have health issues w/ the meter/technology as per a preexisting condition such as migraines, etc. AND that the utility MAY NOT assess further charges other than the normal fees and rates.
Why do things have to be proven harmful? The burden of proof should fall on individuals and corporations who are claiming that they are safe.
@ leyla,
You have a point, but I’m an “innocent until proven guilty” man myself. I believe that’s a sounder policy, particularly when the meters have already passed the industry’s safety tests.
The health issues are only part of the problem with Smart Meters…the data that is collected is just another invasive technique used on us. Do a search on this…find out what is collected and what they can do with it.
@ ELLETA,
I think we all need to get used to data that is not in our direct control. Whether it is information in the “cloud” that we download on our PCs and mobile devices, or digital data about power usage on smart meters that is monitored by utilities, we participate in a massive universe of information in which we have almost unlimited access but only limited control. Does this mean malicious forces are out to get us, or that this is simply a new information environment that we are all getting used to? I take the latter view.
Placing your well-being in the hands of corporate America is like asking McDonalds for a healthy meal. Good luck!