This protest shut down the Capitola PG&E service center, on the same day that Marin residents shut down PG&E's San Rafael offices
Utility Company and State Regulators Ignoring Illnesses Associated with Wireless Meters
Hundreds of PG&E customers- outraged about the health damage caused by wireless ‘smart’ meters- today ramped up protests, testifying at county government meetings and shutting down payment centers in both Santa Cruz and Marin Counties, demanding an immediate halt to the program. Protesters are also angry about PG&E’s attempts to cover up the growing health scandal and recently revealed espionage carried out against their own customers concerned with increasing reports of nausea, headaches, and bouts of dizziness from the meters. The protesters, backed by 22 local governments, and an increasing number of scientists and medical professionals, are demanding that PG&E halt any further installation of smart meters. A statewide investigation is underway into the health impacts from the wireless radiation from the meters, which are suspected of sickening thousands throughout the state.
The EMF Safety Network today also released documents alleging that PG&E ‘smart’ meters violate Federal Communications Commission (FCC) compliance rules. Sandi Maurer, founder of the EMF Safety Network, says, “These rules exist to protect public safety. We are calling for an immediate halt to ‘smart’ meter installation in California and a statewide investigation into these FCC compliance violations.”
On Monday, PG&E sent a number of internal e-mails that it had released to the CPUC, attempting to offer up a sanitized version of the emerging scandal to the regional media. Despite the fact that PG&E had censored the release, there are still a number of alarming revelations:
1) It has become clear that PG&E- using falsified identities- gained access to private e-mail lists to obtain information about how much their customers knew about health impacts from the new meters, what their political activities were, their movements, personal details and other private information.
2) PG&E senior staff referred to their customers who were alarmed about health impacts as ‘insurgents’ and ‘the opposition’
3) An employee that PG&E apparently ordered to monitor the activities of protesters said in a report back to head office, “This is fun- no one said ‘espionage’ in the job description”
4) Confirming that PG&E has declined to order protesters arrested who are obstructing their business, to avoid media attention, one of the e-mails states, “No coffee and donuts. (police arrests) We will give them the platform they are looking for if we do that.”
“Not only are PG&E spying on their own customers in an attempt to cover up health damage from their new meters, they are also insulting our law enforcement officers with an old tired stereotype. Reading over these e-mails, it is clear that PG&E senior officials whose job it is to deliver reliable energy supplies and keep the public safe, are just a bunch of overgrown frat boys who think the health of California families is just a game. The time for removal of ‘smart’ meters and publicly run utilities is now.” said Joshua Hart, director of Stop Smart Meters!
Video of the protests will be available shortly
- We’re trying to protect their children and they call us ‘insurgents’
I have been reading what investors our doing with the Smart Meter program. Where there is new technology there is money to be made. In this case, it seems the money is going to largely come from software to manage the large amount of Data the so called smart meters supply. In essence, PG&E is creating a new global market at our expense.
http://marketpublishers.com/lists/8883/news.html
“$1.4 Billion Smart Grid Utility Data Market Surging Forward 15.6% by 2015
New York — The volume of Smart Grid data that will have to be managed by utilities over the next few years is going to increase dramatically, creating a global data market worth $2.9 billion in 2015. Although much of the Smart Grid funding available worldwide is hardware focused, it is the data that devices like advanced meters generate and the backend applications that will manage and use that data that will be the nervous system and brain of an active and fully capable Smart Grid. Growing utility awareness of the need to manage this data will drive sales of Smart Grid data management (DM) software over the next five years.
The report “Smart Grid Utility Data Market” from leading energy industry market research publisher SBI Energy covers:
The market for Smart Grid data management and security software;
The market for back-end Smart Grid applications providing electrical grid management, data visualization and data analysis capabilities;
Trends in how utilities are investing in Smart Grid data management and back-end software applications;
Profiles of leading Smart Grid software vendors including: eMeter, Oracle Corporation, Aclara Software, Siemens, GE Energy, GridPoint and Areva T&D.
Report Details:
Smart Grid Utility Data Market
Date: December 2010
Pages: 142
Price: US$ 4,800.00
The U.S. is the largest geographic market for Smart Grid data management and back-end software application sales, reaching an estimated $385 million in 2010.
Many utilities are still struggling to understand how the wealth of data generated by Smart Grid technologies can enhance their business model, and which types of Smart Grid software will provide the best return on their investment. While utilities are showing increasing interest in visualization software and outage management systems, it is distribution management systems (DMS) that are expected to provide the best returns. By 2015, SBI Energy estimates almost twice the number of utilities in the U.S. will have a DMS in place compared to 2010.
Much of the Smart Grid funding available worldwide is still hardware focused, particularly for the installation of smart meters. But advanced meters and other sensors are just the fingers of an emerging smarter electrical grid; it is the data that these devices generate and the backend applications that will manage and use that data that will be the nervous system and brain of an active and fully capable Smart Grid.”
Also looks like lots of grant money has been allocated for the study of Smart Meters, our tax dollars at work. Its not an easy rear, but what is evident, Google and PG&E are working together. This makes sense as Google can get on the bandwagon storing and supplying the data from the smart meters.
http://projects.propublica.org/recovery/locale/california/santa-clara
LELAND STANFORD JUNIOR UNIVERSITY, THE $5,006,011 Grant Advanced Research and Projects Agency Energy Financial Assistance Program Smart meters and related sensing technologies promise that energy information will change energy use. Poorly designed interactions with energy information, however, jeopardize billion dollar infrastructure investments. The currrrent problems are numerous: sensor information is complex and dull, incentives are inappropriate, interactions with energy information are poorly designed to modify behavior, and social context is ignored. These problems all involve the intersection of human behavior and technology. The goal of this initiative is to develop a comprehensive human-centered solution that leverages the anticipated widespread diffusion of energy sensors to significantly reduce and shift energy use. Our major innovation is the creation of a transformative system that combines behavioral techniques with human-centered design, computation, and technology to affect energy behavior. The work involves a collaboration of Stanford University researchers and energy industry leaders that was formed in 2008 to establish a new concentration in energy and human behavior. Our group will conduct research, build systems, and test solutions at scale in the field. Our initiative has four parts: (1) a software platform that enables behavioral programs to be implemented at scale; (2) behavioral interventions to reduce and shift energy use; (3) data modeling that incorporates behavior into prescriptive engineering and economic analyses; and (4) an extensible energy communication network to enable future innovation. The behavioral interventions include technology (behavioral analytics, human-centered computational infrastructure), media (interaction design, social networking, games and feedback interfaces), policy (behavioral economic incentive programs) and community (schools, NGO?s, utility and social organizations). Quantitative measurements relating to human behavior and energy efficiency are mostly absent in the literature. However, an analysis of the potential impact of our projects, computed by energy and economic experts specifically for this proposal, indicates substantial influence. We estimate a decrease in residential emissions of 22% annually, with a lower bound of 9% and an upper bound of 33%. Our mid-range projection would prevent 939 megatons of CO2e cumulatively over 2010-2020, and an additional 2,780 megatons between 2020-2030. These reductions are competitive with supply solutions; for example, a reduction in energy use at our lower estimate would reduce fossil fuels consumed and CO2 emissions by an amount equal to a 25-fold increase in wind plus solar power or a doubling of nuclear power (Sweeney, 2007). This initiative already has significant support. At Stanford, we are supported intellectually by the Precourt Institute for Energy, a new organization that organizes researchers across campus to solve energy problems. With industry, our group has formal collaborations with new companies building sensor technology, and we have initiated projects with the Pacific Gas and Electric Company and Google to collaborate on smart meter field trials. The State of California has significant interest in behavioral energy programs, as demonstrated by a $500,000 grant from the California Energy Commission to specifically support cost sharing for this project….
This spending item is part of a $5,006,011 allocation. See details
Energy Department / Office of Science 1/14/2010
Herding the Sheeple. After all… we don’t know what’s best for ourselves anymore, do we? At least our meddling, unconstitutional GOVERNMENT doesn’t think so!
I have NEVER seen the likes of a Big Brother gone wild as I have in these last couple years. UNPRECEDENTED, unconstitutional usurpings… chipping away… till we wake up one day and we have no more freedoms or rights left. Forget baby-steps… this out of control Administration is heading straight on to global government aka New World Order. And The People be damned. Its not about US anymore (if it ever WAS)… the wacko far left liberal Progressive/ Communists care more about plants and animals than humans. And if they had THEIR way (which they very well MAY soon at this rate)… we will be culled and “de-developed” (depopulation) and our American way of life FOREVER GONE.
“Smart Meter”? Nah… more like COMMIE Meter shoved down your throat with your rights usurped to OPT OUT of this nonsense. As far as health concerns… I have a sneaking suspicion that this was well known all along by Smart-a$$ meter’s developers. Like I said… the people be DAMNED. As long as it’s all in the name of “the COLLECTIVE good.” Am I living in a nightmare version of freakin’ Alice in Wonderland? WHERE DID MY RIGHTS GO?! WHERE IS MY AMERICA THE LAND OF THE ‘FREE’?!!!
Thanks Jane. I agree with a large portion of what you say, and I am glad we agree on Smart Meters. I blame the left and the right equally and I think they have all gone wild. For me, it’s not about being liberal or not, its really about most of us NOT being part of the controlling elite, who permeate both sides of the Liberal and Conservative spectrum.
Here, we, the common people, we are really the same in the sense were being screwed by the same folks, both liberal, conservative elite. It doesn’t mater if we are of the same political leanings on other issues. I say this not to spawn and argument, but to simply say I am glad to see you posting. I believe the growing movement of people against this will be a diverse group of differing ideologies and politics. I think this is a good thing, an asset even, if we can unite together against what we all perceive as a threat to our liberty, freedom, health etc. — no mater how we may see ourselves as, conservative, liberal, progressive, whatever. Only united will we ever stop this.
Peace and Happy New Year
T
Wireless technology has been around for years (networking, cell phones, etc.), with no adverse effects – you may even use a wireless router in your own home. Starbucks hotspot is wireless tech. Why don’t you focus on the accuracy of the “smart meters?” Isn’t that the real issue?