Stop Smart Meters! Investigates: Utilities Lie While People Die

4 Responses to Stop Smart Meters! Investigates: Utilities Lie While People Die

1. Paul H says:

   July 10, 2013 at 7:06 am

   Josh,

   Thanks for taking the time to expose the lies. I wonder how many lives you have saved by exposing this monstrosity?

   For some it’s not a problem inflicting harm when told to do so. She is demonstrated in this video called “The Milgram Experiment”, clip starting at 7:22.
   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pdb20gcc_Ns

   Reply
2. Marilynne Martin says:

   July 10, 2013 at 7:34 am

   Although the utilities claim in their literature with consumers that smart meters are safe and do not cause fires, they argue different things with their regulators.

   Florida Power & Light, as an example, filed a Petition for declaratory statement regarding the repair and replacement of meter enclosures for smart meters on Jan 19, 2011 (filing can be found here http://www.floridapsc.com/dockets/cms/docketFilings3.aspx?docket=110033.

   In such filing they argue “As FPL installs the smart meters, in a very small percentage of cases (less than 0.4%) the Company encounters situations where meter enclosures are functional prior to the removal of the existing electromechanical meter and may have continued to function without a problem for many years to come, but during the course of the change-out the existing meter enclosure needs to be repaired or replaced in order to safely and efficiently install the new smart meter in a manner that will help to assure safe and reliable service to the customer. The need to repair or replace the affected meter enclosures occurs in two distinct situations. First, during the course of the meter change-out the existing functional meter enclosure is damaged and must be repaired or replaced in order to safely and efficiently install the new smart meter in a manner that will help to assure safe and reliable service to the customer into the future. In the second scenario, the Company cannot say with certainty that the existing functional meter enclosure is clearly damaged by the removal of the existing meter or the installation of the new smart meter. However, as a result of the meter change-out there is enough doubt about the continued viability of the existing meter enclosure that the Company exercises its judgment and errs on the side of repairing or replacing the meter enclosure. This action is taken as part of the system wide installation of smart meters and represents an effort to avoid a situation where the individual customer experiences problems with the meter and/or meter enclosure within a relatively short time following the change-out. Accordingly, the Company does not believe that the individual customer should be responsible for the costs associated with this work.”

   Now fast forward to June 6, 2013. FP&L does another filing, see http://www.floridapsc.com/dockets/cms/docketFilings3.aspx?docket=130160

   FP&L has completed their deployment of 4.5 million smart meters. They were suppose to inspect each meter enclosure and do repairs prior to installing the new smart meter to ensure they were safe to install. Per media reports they repaired 180,000 meter enclosures. see http://www.palmbeachpost.com/news/business/fpl-contends-customers-must-pay-equipment-costs-co/nYc2C/

   Now they find that some of their smart meters have stopped communicating. They shut down, possibly due to overheating. They want to do a study of 400 meters. They want to develop a “predictive tool” so in the future they can send customer notices that their meter enclosures need replacement – fix it or we shut off your electricity (IMHO).

   We have been successful in getting the Florida Office of Public Counsel to intervene in this new filing. Hopefully we can stop the rubber stamping of the FPSC and get some answers. But it appears that our meter enclosures are not all compatible with the new smart meters. It seems that this should have come out before the project was started. New meter enclosures should have been recommended. But if you add the cost of new meter enclosures into the cost/benefit analysis it would most likely lead to a no/go decision, right? So just ignore it.

   Those who don’t yet have smart meters in their states/towns need to surface this issue during the debate. Older meter boxes create a safety issue. Its in black and white in these FP&L filings, make them address it before they start deploying.

   Reply
3. Ron says:

   July 16, 2013 at 2:08 pm

   We have a systemic problem here with inherent fire hazards, well documented in this video covering smeter fires:

   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fBDgZjR4qHQ

   Reply

4. Pingback: Letter to Sun-Sentinel re: FP&L Latest “Smart” Meter Enclosure Fraud | Stop "Smart" Meters, Florida!

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