As discussed in yesterday’s post, in a pre hearing last May on Phase 2 of the CPUC Smart Meter hearings, several parties urged the CPUC to make health impacts from Smart Meters front and center in Phase 2, especially because in Phase 1 this topic was completely disregarded. Commissioner Peevey (former executive of Southern California Edison), however, on June 8, 2012, again denied allowing health impacts to be part of the Smart Meter hearings. He said that he was not “persuaded that it would be appropriate to expand the scope to review the alleged health impacts of smart meters.”
What has happened since then is that a very interesting ruling by the Maine Supreme Continue reading →
In the next few days I will be posting links to the opening briefs on Phase 2 of the California PUC Smart Meter Hearings. (I was up until 4 Am working on a brief myself.)
In an initial hearing last May, several parties urged the CPUC to make health impact from Smart Meters front and center in Phase 2, especially as in Phase 1 this topic was completely disregarded. As a result, there was a vast disconnect between the hundreds of people coming up to discuss health issues and the CPUC declaring it wasn’t “within the scope” and in some cases even shutting people down.
Commissioner Peevey, on June 8, 2012, issued a ruling for the Second Phase of the Smart Meter Hearings where he again denied allowing health impacts to be part of the Smart Meter hearings. He said that he was not “persuaded that it would be appropriate to expand the scope to review the alleged health impacts of smart meters.” He limited the scope of the hearings to mainly cost issues. However, he did allow parties to submit briefs on whether charging opt out fees to people who are opting out because of health issues violates the Americans with Disabilities Act.
There are some very powerful and effective documents which were submitted by parties on both sides. There is an especially elegant argument made by Center for Accessible Technology (see ADA_Smart_Meter_Briefing_PDFA ) on why the ADA applies which I discuss briefly in my own brief. Below is my brief and here are two links from two sides: Southern California Edison: A.11-03-014 et al PGE SM Opt-out_SCE OpeningBrief Re ADA Community-1 (they don’t acknowledge that people can become sick from RF exposure); and a powerful brief by California resident David L. Wilner (See OpeningBrief-1) who has a lot to say about the CPUC and the way they are handling the health issues. May the Games Begin! 🙂
BEFORE THE PUBLIC UTILITIES COMMISSION OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA
Application of Pacific Gas and Electric Application 11-03-014
Company for Approval of Modifications to (Filed March 24, 2011)
Stop Smart Meters Irvine Opening Brief on Smart Meter Issues July 16, 2012
The CPUC Ruling to Limit Health Issues from Phase 2 of the Smart Meter Hearings Commissioner Peevey has stated in his ruling for Phase 2 of the Smart Meter hearings that health concerns are not to be included in the scope of these hearings (nor was it investigated in Phase 1). Stop Smart Meters, Irvine (SSM-Irvine) believes that the CPUC by narrowing the scope to exclude health effects from smart meters abdicated one of its primary responsibilities to California residents; and that like with the state of Maine’s Public Utilities Commission which took a similar hands off approach to health matters and whose state supreme court, on July 12, 2012, overruled it stating the Maine PUC’s review of health issues was inadequate—the California Public Utilities Commission also has a responsibility–as its mission statement says—to ensure utility service safety. The Maine Supreme Judicial Court also told their PUC that it was not sufficient for the Maine PUC in fulfilling their obligation to investigate health to simply defer to another government agency, such as the FCC (something the California PUC Commissioner Peevey, himself, has done). Like the Maine PUC, the California PUC has tried to ignore the health issues from Smart Meters (saying it is out of their purview)—without doing a full and public investigation themselves (which even one of their own departments the Division of Ratepayer Advocates strongly recommended in 2010) of the health issues.
A Digression: The FCC is currently the “go to” governmental agency for Radio Frequency Electromagnetic standards–but the FCC’s standards have not been updated since 1996 and they are based on research from the 1980’s. The FCC standards according to Dr. Franz Adlkofer, Continue reading →
The following video is a presentation of Dr. Leif Salford, neurosurgeon and researcher, discussing his animal studies on radio frequency radiation and its effects on the brain. “Dr. Salford,” writes Arthur Firstenberg in his paper Silent Wireless Spring, “exposed over 1600 experimental animals to low level microwave radiation. Their results were consistent and worrisome: microwave radiation. . ..caused the blood-brain barrier . . .to leak.” (It was repeated in 2003 on 32 additional animals; they waited this time 8 weeks before “sacrificing them”–and found “up to two percent of the neurons in all areas of the brain were shrunken and degenerated.”Dr. Salford, says Firstenberg, called the “potential implications ‘terrifying.'”
An argument is sometimes made (not necessarily accurately) to those who express concern about radiation from “smart” meters, Wi Fi, etc, that the radiation emitted from these devices is at such a low level that the public needn’t worry about it. However Dr. Salford’s studies showed opening up of the blood brain barrier from very low levels of radiation. In fact, Cindy Sage and Dr. David Carpenter write in a 2008 paper (Public Health Implications of Wireless Technologies) it was “the weakest exposure level [which] showed the greatest effect in opening up the BBB [blood brain barrier].”
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) will conduct a formal review of the U.S. cell phone radiation standards according to a Bloomberg news report. . . .
An FCC spokesperson emailed a statement to a Bloomberg reporter that is truly alarming. Her message suggests that the FCC has already decided that the current standards are fine, and will conduct a review to rubber stamp the 1996 FCC guidelines:
“Tammy Sun, a spokeswoman for the agency, said in an e-mailed statement. The notice won’t propose rules, Sun said.
‘Our action today is a routine review of our standards,’ Sun said. ‘We are confident that, as set, the emissions guidelines for devices pose no risks to consumers.'”
The Bloomberg article cites a major review of the literature conducted by our research center in which we found an association between mobile phone use and increased brain tumor risk especially after 10 years of cell phone use:
“There is possible evidence linking mobile-phone use to an increased risk of tumors, according to a study of scientific studies and articles that was published in 2009 in the Journal of Clinical Oncology.”
The research we reviewed and subsequent research strongly suggest that the current standards for cell phone radiation are not adequate to protect us from health risks associated with exposure to cell phone radiation. A year ago, a 31-member group of experts convened by the World Health Organization agreed with our conclusions and classified cell phone radiation a “possible carcinogen.”
The FCC standards were established in 1996 at a time when few adults used cell phones. Today, children and most adults are exposed to far more cell phone radiation Continue reading →
This is a “sister” post to the previous one about possible sperm and fertility damage to males from cell phone radiation. The video talks about a young Asian women whose demographics to acquire breast cancer are low, but nevertheless developed unusual pattern of tumors (which required a mastectomy) where she would store her cell phone. Environmental Health Trust writes: “Growing numbers of young women in this fast-paced connected society keep their phones in their bras, hijabs (headscarves), or pockets–unaware of manufacturers’ hidden warnings. Distinguished cancer specialists Robert Nagourney and John West, comment on an unusual case of multiple breast tumors in a young woman who had kept her cell phone in her bra. . . .”
Today the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) approved a smart meter opt out option for both Southern California Edison and San Diego Gas and Electric customers. Please share this information with friends and neighbors.
From the SCE press release: “Starting May 9, customers may opt out by calling 1-800-810-2369. For customers already on the delay list, calling the number will enable them to enroll in the opt-out program and keep their current meters. Customers who have a smart meter, but would like to opt out, can have their meter exchanged for the type (i.e. electro-mechanical analog meter or non analog, non-smart digital meter) that was previously in place.” San Diego Gas and Electric (SDG&E) has not yet announced the date their opt out will go into effect, but they need to offer it within twenty days. Their contact number is 1-800-411-7383 .
Even though the CPUC has given the utilities permission to charge (price gouge?) California rate payers to opt out (a 75 dollar initial fee even if you already have an analog and a ten dollar additional monthly fee) I recommend that people still go for it. They don’t want you to. (They have many plans–financial incentives–for their smart grid including feeding your information to third party vendors). Inactivate their “smart” meter program by refusing to participate! Also, when you opt out you can send a note that you are paying the opt out fee “under protest.” See also the Northern Californian web site Stop Smart Meters! for other suggestions to challenge the fees.
Besides the satisfaction of not going along with the big utility monoliths, there are, of course, other reasons to opt out of a “smart” meter. It is extremely easy for all of us to be inattentive to the possible effects of non ionizing radiation–as it is invisible, has no taste or smell, etc. You can only tell if you are being irradiated if you have a special meter/analyzer or if you happen to be electrohypersensitive.
However, there are too many studies, including WHO’s designation of it as a carcinogen, which show (even as it becomes so ubiquitous in our society) that radiofrequency electromagnetic radiation may have adverse health effects. A recent Yale study involving cell phones and mice, for example, showed cognitive changes from non ionizing radiation. Also, even though you may not be able to immediately feel the effects RF electromagnetic radiation is having on you, your cells are still responding. As the late Dr.Neil Cherry has said in a radio interview“Our brain is an electromagnetic organ. [In] our central nervous system, every cell communicates with its neighbors to see how they are–using electromagnetic signals.” One effect RF electromagnetic radiation can have is to disrupt the calcium ions in our brains. Says Dr. Cherry “calcium ions control the neurotransmitters in the brain. . . .If you expose the brain to these frequencies-you alter the calcium ions–you alter the brain patterns. That’s what Ross Adey in California showed; repeated by the EPA; Carl Blackman; and it’s been repeated in about 10 or 12 laboratories in the world–that calcium ions are changed by these signals. That’s pretty well established. Frequencies match and cells react and change the behavior which changes the brain pattern, the reaction time.”
To stay updated about the ins and outs of the Smart Meter rulings, please see the following web sites and Facebook pages: Burbank Action, StopOCSmartMeters,Stop Smart Meters Now (Facebook), Center for Electrosmog Prevention, EMF Safety Network, Stop Smart Meters! and Eon3emfblog. among others. There continue to be many issues with the smart meter opt out option (and the smart grid in general): it doesn’t allow businesses to opt out; doesn’t address multiple co-located smart meters; the soon to come (useless for you but lucrative for them) gas and water “smart” meters, etc.
My web site Stop Smart Meters Irvine also has archived articles, links and occasional updates. I am not able to update it regularly, but the entire wireless issue (that is the complete irradiation of our public spaces) continues to advance.
Just FYI, Here are Some Mainly Local Examples:
1.Wi Fi on OCTA Buses. The metal buses create what Dr. George Carlo calls a resonant cavity (increasing the radiation level); it’s like riding in a travelling microwave oven. (For a funny take on the “microwave oven” idea, see Stephen Colbert’s video where he puts an Amy’s burrito between himself and his cell phone).
2. Wi Fi In Medical Clinics. In Irvine, medical clinics now offer irradiation services for free (no co pays) not in the radiology department but in the waiting room: The Kaiser Permanente medical clinic in Woodbridge, Irvine, frequented by newborns, people with pacemakers and others with various illnesses is now fitted with radiation emitting wi fi–because their administrator told me “their members wanted it.”
3 The Irvine libraries have routers right above the reference desk so the employees are exposed to this all day long. Bonjour? I recommend they brush up on their French and call the National Library of France-where Wi Fi was completely removed because librarians became active and protested the health effects.
4. Buy your Daisy Sour Cream. Irradiate your Head! If you shop at the local grocery stores, you can be irradiated as you do your grocery shopping (Albertson’s Campus store, dairy section; look above you on the wall–the spider like device is a high powered router. (There is Wi Fi in Ralphs and Gelsons, also.)
5. Mission Viejo Library: Special teen only section with cool irradiating spider: The irradiating “spider” is also affixed to a wall at the Mission Viejo Library near the children’s area.
6. RF Chips Credit Cards: Also besides not holding (as neurosurgeon Dr. Keith Black recommends) your cell phone to your brain, you might think twice about stashing your new credit card in your pocket or bra–because the credit companies are now installing RF chips in these, which creates not only health but security risks. See this you tube video for the security issues. Note: If your company sends you such a card, you can punch the RF chip out with a hole puncher.)
“One of the most amazing things that has happened to mankind in the last hundred years is the Internet. It’s given us possibility beyond our wildest imagination. But we also know the vulnerabilities that exist inside of it. And then we have the backbone, the energy, what powers our nation, the power grid. Those two are coming together. And it’s the smart meter on your home or our business that is allowing that connectivity to start.” –Cyber Expert David Chalk
“Now for the first time in human history, brain tumors are the number one cancer killer of children under the age of 18–for the first time in history. That should tell you something.”– B. Blake Levitt interviewed in film, Full Signal.
Below is the trailer for the documentary film Full Signal. If you want to see the entire film, it costs 2.99. I think it’s worth it as it has some excellent interviews of experts such as medical writer B. Blake Levitt, Dr. David Carpenter, Dr. Louis Slesin, PhD, and Dr. Olle Johansson. One point B. Blake Levitt makes is that because cell phones and other wireless are on the market and in widespread use, people think that any safety issue with them would have been taken care of–wouldn’t it?
One Director: “I think the 166 dollars up front will convince them they can really afford a lot of tin foil hats.” Another Director:“But they’re already wearing them.”
This is an amazing, damaging audio. I wouldn’t be surprised if it disappeared. (See note** below.) It’s an audio of the Sacramento Municipal Utility District (SMUD) board of directors at a 2/29/12 committee meeting discussing their smart meter opt out program. This audio besides revealing the sham opt out that SMUD is offering their 600,000 customers (they offer only a radio off smart meter with severe restrictions and fees) is also a warning to residents everywhere about how the utility companies are trying to kill the opt out options while pretending to be customer responsive.
Sacramento Municipal Utility District, their website says, is “the nation’s sixth-largest electric utility that’s owned by its customers.” However, they do not seem very friendly to customers who don’t want smart meters. They see the opt out option as a temporary blip (something they are tolerating while they machinate about how to make it as unpalatable as possible) in their goal to have 100% smart meter compliance.
At about 20 minutes in the tape below (about 1:10 on the official tape), the discussion becomes “juicy,” as if someone had planted a mic in a back room, closed door session. I took notes as I listened:
They discuss the opt out fee. They are trying to balance (for their reputation) a fee which will make it appear that they are being fair and sensitive to customers—that is the highest number they can get away with so that it still looks like they are sensitive–but which will actually discourage people from choosing the opt out, which is their goal (to have no opt out option).
One Director: “This is going to be subsidized, but it’s a very small amount of money because the number’s going to drop off precipitously. And you’ve priced it and I understand the logic of how you priced it so it’s not totally out of the ballpark for someone to be able to pay. So what’s going to happen is people will say–that’s fine. I’ll take the meter. So my guess is you are going to be down under 500 when they see these numbers. . . .”
The Fee Can Go Up But Never Down. They want it Only One Way (their way). They discuss “periodically” making price “adjustment[s]” based on participation. They are, however, very concerned that social media and publicity will mean more people will want to opt out of smart meters. If that happens, they don’t want to lower the cost. So they want to set it up so that the cost can go up if fewer people actually opt out–but not go down. If, for example, a lot of people actually (via social media) were to get on board–then that would be “damaging to the project.”
Their goal is to kill the opt out. One of the persons even says if it gets to a low enough number such as 90 people, then they will be moved to a smart meter: “the remaining 90 customers must move to a smart meter or tell them they will increase it by quite a bit.”
Here’s another (partial) quote:“Making sure we’re not making it too easy for customers to not go along with the program–but not be responsive to customers. . . think this is a right balance. $124.00 and $54.00 a month is going to be very expensive for the vast majority of our customers. . .We’re willing to work with you. More than that money would look so cost prohibitive, would look like we’re not going to give them an option.”
Are these guys former tobacco company executives?
Tell As Few Customers as Possible About Their Right to Not have a smart Meter: They want as much as possible to keep this “under the radar”(one actually used that phrase). So they will only send a letter with information about the opt out to people already on the list. They will not advertise it on their web site.
They discuss how to handle this with the press/Sacramento Bee. One Director: “Smud adopts opt out–working to have a neutral story–giving the messaging point we would discuss today. We would not communicate or discuss with the press the nuances of different rate options. We would simply be very direct and focused. This is our opt out policy (on lots of complicated issues been able to mitigate and neutralize the press. . .) Story would pretty much be a non story very quickly.”
Other Quotes:
“We’ve constrained this pretty tightly”
Keeping the cost high so the customer will say“Never mind. We’ll take the meter.”
Higher Up Front Costs by “creating a shorter payback: Director Sherman: “Can we narrow our rate action strictly to 2500 [customers] and there is no opt out for the folks who already have them[Smart Meters]. Just narrow it just to those folks and also I’m wondering . . .given Nancy’s calculation shall we reconfigure it with a shorter payback [laughter]. There ought to be—–These are actual costs and we’re giving you a break because we’re doing it over these many years versus. . what we ought to do is tell you to pay it right up front–all of it.”
This (their phoney program) is the “cost to get past this problem”: Director:“So my guess is you are going to be down under 500 when they see these numbers–that middle number that you put up so SMUD is going to bear the costs, but it’s a cost to get past this problem. That’s really what it is. With the constraints that you’ve put on it–If you put the constraints of nobody else except this group and if you move the meter goes in, the calendar will take care of the problem.”
If You Move You lose the Opt Out. Their concession to offer an opt out is not good faith or fair and square with their customers (whom they laugh at repeatedly in the meeting) but rather as one director put it:“A bridging effort toward getting everyone on the smart meter grid. . .If someone feels trapped in their home, they may feel trapped in their home for a whole host of reasons.” (The trapped discussion has to do with they are making this such a narrow opt out that someone will not be able to move to a different home and have the opt out)
To Make It Still Harder: “Sunset clause–opt in prior to end of year–Closed after that.””After 9 months no new enrollments“ [This is also so the social media doesn’t get onto it and people learn they can do this. So they are making it available in a very small window period.]
Disparaging toward customers (as in the quote at the beginning): Customers health concerns about effects of radiation is called an “extreme” viewpoint. One Director:“I have no sympathy. Clearly their concerns are unfounded in my mind. If you think it will give you a stomach ache, it will.”
What to do with recalcitrant customers who refuseto have their Analogs Changed out: Turn off Power or call the Sheriff.
“The less that’s said about this [opt out option] the better.”
**Note/Update One: The website EON3EMF Blog as a public service recorded the smart meter opt out discussion portion of the SMUD board meeting and posted it to youtube.
Update Two.Burbank and Glendale Opt Outs, As Bad as SMUD’s. Directors and/or staff on the SMUD tape also discuss how they are networking with other utilities to develop strategies to discourage the opt out. The residents of Burbank and Glendale just received very restrictive sham opt outs also, with Burbank’s being one of the worst in the nation as Kiku Lani Iwata, co-founder of Burbank Action writes in an opinion piece in The Burbank Leader. Like SMUD customers, Burbank/Glendale customers will not be allowed to keep their analog meters; they will have a limited 60 Day period in which to opt out, but if they ever move, they may be forced to have a radiation emitting “smart” meter.
We need to tell our utility companies and our elected representatives that these type of (to use Sandi Maurer’s phrase) “shenanigans” are unacceptable, a violation of the public trust. Utilities need to work with ratepayers in Good Faith. Customers should be given a true option. As Kiku Lani Iwata writes in her opinion piece: “Burbank Water and Power officials compare smart meters to cell phones and wireless routers. But those are not mandated in our homes, and we have freedom of choice to turn them off.. . .Our federal government and state do not mandate that [the utility companies] force these on our homes. Give us back our privacy, our freedom of choice, civil liberties and homes, and respect our right to protect our health, happiness and quality of life within the safety and sanctity of our own homes. Our homes are not public spaces.”
The CPUC has issued their proposed rulings (to be voted upon in April) for opting out of a Smart Meter for both San Diego Gas & Electric and Southern California Edison. Both proposals are similar to PG&E’s, with the utilities charging 75 dollars upfront and 10 dollars monthly, in order for customers to keep what they already have, which some people have said is like being double charged. However, the SCE proposal does not allow customers who currently have a digital non smart meter to choose an analog meter. They may, the SCE proposed ruling states, only “retain the meter currently installed at their location or receive the meter form (i.e., an analog meter or a non-analog, non-smart digital meter) that had been at the customer’s locationprior to the installation of a wireless smart meter.”
A “digital non smart meter” also emits RF radiation (though not, like smart meters in a “mesh” network; instead the meter is read by the utility from a truck or the sidewalk). Some people have suffered health effects from this type of meter, such as shattering of the ear drum from the pulses. SCE should be doing what the other two utilities are doing and offering the analog meter option to all its customers.
SCE’s SmartConnect website is urging consumers to go ‘read the fine print’ on the face of their new wireless meters once an hour to see what kind of energy use they’ve had. No one could make this up. It is unbelievable.
In order to get any benefit whatsoever for this multi-billion dollar SCE investment of ratepayer money in this new technology, the consumer is being told to go put your face to the meter and read the electrical use information that changes once an hour, telling you how much electricity you’ve just used. Despite the excessively high pulsed RF that continues to be produced from the meter, as you are looking at it, searching for the data, SCE says you must take on this additional risk to your eyes and your health. Today new information from Southern California Edison SmartConnect’s website gives instructions to consumers on how to read electric usage at the meter.
SCE SmartConnect advice to homeowners is as follows:
At a Glance: Reading a Smart Meter Your energy usage appears on one of the smart meter’s five-second rotating digital displays. Wait for the screen where “001” appears in the upper-left corner. Each time you use a kilowatt hour (kWh) of electricity, the display will increase by one. This screen shows a cumulative number, much like a car odometer, so you can calculate your current month’s usage by subtracting the previous total.
The print size of the digital display lettering is about three-sixteenths of an inch high, and there is a rotation of three types of information that prolongs the necessary reading time. People will be required to come very close to the face of this wireless radiation device in order to read anything about kilowatt hour usage. The close distance at which consumers will have to stand to read the very small print on wireless meter displays will place them within a few inches of transmitting antennas. They may also use their hands to shield their eyes from glare, so the hands may even come in contact with the meter face.
The FCC Grants of Authorization require a separation distance of 8″ or 20 centimeters. What about near-sighted people? What about people who shield the glare with their hands in front of their faces, or touch the meter? We are supposed to STAY AWAY from RF transmitting devices, not stare at them. Does this advice directly invalidate the FCC compliance statements and testing requirements to be ‘safe’? The sensitivity of the eye to radiofrequency radiation is well established. SCE is putting consumers at risk with this advice. Wearing wire-rimmed glasses can intensify the radiofrequency exposure for the eyes.
Since the entire purpose of wireless utility meters is to provide consumers with timely information in order to reduce electric usage, this advice directly encourages people to place themselves at risk for damage to the eyes, and possibly for the face, neck and hands.
For those with multiple meters, standing with the body against other meters while trying to read information will cause more radiofrequency radiation exposure for more of the body (for example, in multifamily living units where there can be eight or twelve meters in a bank).
A report by Sage Associates (2011) documents radiofrequency radiation from wireless utility meters, and provides evidence from the industry which underscores the vulnerability of some human body parts and tissues, in particular the susceptibility of the eyes and testes to non-uniform and potentially harmful heating from radiofrequency radiation.
From the Report Conclusions
Eyes and Testes – Safety standards for peak exposure limits to radiofrequency have not been developed to take into account the particular sensitivity of the eyes, testes and other Continue reading →
2/29/12 This morning while I had some free time when I was in Mission Viejo, I decided to take a walk and pass out “smart” meter flyers. I drove north on Crown Valley Parkway and stopped in a neighborhood of newer homes, with inviting front porches and street names suggestive of Great Britain. This is a home on “Downing Street.”
This was not Mission Viejo, I realized when I looked up and glanced at the street sign, but rather a newer area called “Ladera Ranch.” For most people who need to be closer to LA, it is out in the boondocks, but it is so beautiful anyone would love to live there.
However, when I got to the end of one cul de sac, I had my first sighting ever of a “Medusa” or “collector meter” which I want to share so you know what it looks like. The collector meter is the same diameter as the other smart meters (called relay meters) but it rests on a “cuff” so it extends out more. It contains three antennas instead of two. They call it a “collector” meter because it collects the information from several hundred other smart meters and then transmits that information wirelessly to the utility company. Because it is more “active,” it emits more radiation. This was a San Diego Gas and Electric Itron Meter. I think this homeowner might want to get on the analog list.
When I got home I saw my own walkway, which is on the other side of my neighbor’s smart meter, had a new pile of dead bees. This, dead bees in our garden, is a new occurrence. Sometimes they aren’t yet “dead,” but I see them walking on the ground, not able to fly or get back to their hive.
We had this posted earlier, but there was a copyright issue, which is now resolved. Enjoy. The director, Josh Del Sol, also put together a piece called “Gandhi on Smart Meters” which I will post below. Here is the official site for the film and also a Facebook page.
Director Del Sol writes, “Gandhi’s Message is more relevant today than ever.”
Dr. Mercola interviews (see video below) Alasdair Philips of Powerwatch.org.uk. Philips has been “researching electromagnetic fields effect on health” for decades and his website is a resource for those who want to read the studies. In the interview (which is free ranging) Philips shares details about various studies as well as what he thinks the research as a whole is showing. He also shares a wealth of other information about the wireless devices themselves and the radiation they are emitting. It’s a long interview and here are my [rough draft] notes (close paraphrase and direct quotes) as I listened to it.
Power Lines and Childhood Leukemia: Philips discusses how power lines, when their magnetic fields go above a certain level, double the rate of childhood leukemia. The level when this occurs, though, is only a “tiny fraction of the standard set for our protection.”He said there are over twenty studies which show the increased rate. Standards: He said (10:04) the “standardizing process” which was set via the World Health Organization’s EMF Project was industry funded. It was dominated for 30 years by one person, Michael Repacholi (with connections to an NGO, ICNIRP). Those standards are now “set in stone.” The “thermal effects” (which is the standard the FCC uses) he considers a “red herring.” None of the concerns about cancer, he says, come from the “thermal effects.”
He discusses melatonin, what our bodies produce when we sleep, as “radio protective anti cancer” (that is, it helps us fight the damage from the radiation we are exposed to during the day from wireless devices, including “smart” meters, and antennas. This is why it is important to sleep in a very dark room. [He gives details about what can interfere with melatonin production]. At 21:23 on the tape, he discusses mobile phones. “Since 1998 the evidence has mounted and mounted,” he says. He has “no doubt that it causes brain tumors.” Cell Phones Versus Cordless: The newer 3G cell phones can turn themselves down–will expose you less than a cordless phone, which pulse 24/7 even when you’re not using them. For Cell Phones, “ideally use an air tube.” The prior 2G phones pulses 217 times a second–so perhaps 3G is slightly better. Cell Phones and Cancer. He says at about 55:00 minutes in the video that they are seeing increasing “frontal and temporal” brain tumors. At the same time, there is a decrease [statistically] in brain tumors. He thinks the decrease is because we’ve passed the peak from atomic bomb testing. . .but the brain tumors (in specific areas near where cell phones are used) are “on the rise.” He talks about a study in August about children and cell phones. In that study there is a “table 5” which discusses “three, four and five fold increases [in tumors] if they’ve had the phone for 7 or 8 years.” “May not need a lot of exposure to trigger that initial derangement of the cell which goes into tumors. Most cancers have nothing to do with breaking a covalent bond. So what. Most cancer is not due to covalant bond breaking. We haven’t got a clue as to what causes cancers and what the mechanism is. . . Gene switches. .. which are caused by stress. . . .”
Wi Fi: He says get rid of the wi fi, (completely unnecessary) that now there is something called D-Lan–where you can plug Ethernet cable into main socket and then in any room in the house you can plug in another device (without laying extra wires). “Comparing Wi-Fi levels with levels you get 100 meters from a cell phone tower, which is roughly the same. . . . If you’re sitting next to a wi-fi lap top with a wi-fi router in the houses. . . it’s equivalent to having a small mobile phone base station in your house.”
Back to Cell Phones (and Effect of RF on Vulnerable Tissues such as testes and Eyes): He cites Sam Milham : Ham radio operators got a cataract on their eyes–on the inside of their eyes which is inoperable. He thinks using bluetooth (“something stuck in your ear, low levels of microwave) is crazy.” He warns (commonly done by teenagers) to not put one’s cell phone under one’s pillow: You “don’t want to be lying on it where it’s really going to be struggling to get its signal out to a base station.” Women shouldn’t tuck it into their bras.
Doctor who treated tumors with radiation: “5 minute exposure to cell phone. . could turn a 5% active tumor into a 95% active tumor for about an hour. So if he did that first his radiation therapy was more effective. . .” See 1:06:00 on tape about ways cells contaminate other cells and can cause cancer (not by breaking bonds).
At 1:01:00 in the tape he talks about how our exposure now to electromagnetic radiation from all this technology is a “billion fold” from what it was [for thousands of years prior).
The website 5GWiFi, set up by Irvine-based Broadcom, offers a “primer” on the new IEEE 802.11 ac or “5G” Wi Fi chip. Scroll down to the “technical details” to read about the RF spectrum and “beamforming.” Note: Be prepared when reading industry ads to be transported “kidlike” back to Superman watching days: This chip will allow people to be “on the move,” taking their devices wherever they please to form “ad-hoc” work groups. It will improve, they say, “connectivity,” opening up a whole new “freeway” with lots of driving room (“wide lanes”) for one’s data and an ability with the “beamforming” capacity to avoid “potholes,” and penetrate surfaces heretofore impermeable to Wi-Fi such as concrete:
“Many factors affect the coverage area of a network—most notably, the way a structure is built. Concrete walls, ceramic bathroom tile, and metal appliances are more difficult for Wi-Fi signals to penetrate, in contrast to wooden walls with gypsum board, which are easier to penetrate. But signals from IEEE 802.11ac networks, with beamforming and other innovations, do a much better job in penetrating all forms of building materials than do the signals from its predecessor networks. In fact, the ability of IEEE 802.11ac signals to transmit through some concrete walls is expected to help homes in India and China, where concrete is used extensively as a construction material.”
One can get so swept away reading industry ads, that it may only occur later, when one is scrubbing the kitchen sink, the window slider open even though it is a gray day and they are predicting rain, that the ability of these new chips to penetrate concrete, ceramic and metal means that along with all the “exciting” new features the new 5G WiFi chip is “offering,” it will also be disrespecting our boundaries and invading our personal spaces: the walls of our homes, the skin which separates our bodies from the air around us; and, as the IARC WHO “Working Group” wrote in its discussion of EMF’s in The Lancet Oncology, it will, in fact, “couple” with our bodies “resulting in induced electric and magnetic fields and associated currents inside tissues”; and people who want to shield from this radiation will have a lot more difficulty.
This past week, my attention was on Wi-Fi in schools as I have a third grader whose school has both cabled internet and Wi-Fi routers. (I spoke this past week to both the school board and the PTA.) When I had asked a school official, a few months ago, why they needed, since the school was already cabled, Wi-Fi, I was told it was so teachers could teach special lessons using IPADs. The official told me the goal was “to blanket” every corner of the school in Wi-Fi.
The school district seems to take an aloof but polite approach to any parent who brings up the topic. The parents can give various feedback but they are “out of the loop” in terms of having a kind of working input. The district personnel become increasingly quiet and non responsive and do not get back about meetings that initially they proposed. At the end of this week, I learned not from a school official but from another parent that the school district has ordered “safety testing.”
What kind of “safety testing” could this be? Could it possibly be someone who will come in and do readings to confirm that the Wi-Fi “does not exceed FCC limits?” Is this the school district version of Edison and PG&E? Yet industry (utility as well as mobile phone companies) are big business, and we’re used to them behaving with a kind of ruthlessness when it comes to squelching information which could interfere with their market goals. But for a school district? For principals and teachers to behave that way? For educators?
Barry Trower, retired British military intelligence scientist, a physicist and specialist in microwaves, does not mince words about Wi-Fi or the way school personnel are handling this: “Wi Fi should be wiped out of schools at a stroke today to protect all the children,” he states. I suspect he would also call into question the so-called “safety testing” my son’s school district has ordered: “A lot of people make the mistake in believing that children are small adults. And unlike medication—there you have an adult dose and a children’s dose–with microwaves there is the adult dose, but there is no known safe dose of microwave safe radiation anywhere in the world published for a child.” He says the schools are using “intentional ignorance. . . They will only look at and believe the research they want to. They will not acknowledge most of the real research and most of the risks. There is such a pressure and hype to get this technology.”
In the videos below (and also the illustration that he drew to make the point as simple as possible), Trower discusses genetic effects of exposing children and our population to microwave radiation. He is especially concerned about Wi-Fi because of its impact on young children.
Here are two videos of Barry Trower, the first a short one and the second a longer interview. This quote is taken from the second interview:
Young girls are born with all the . . . . eggs they are going to need to develop into fully grown eggs and children. We know that microwaves affect the ovarian follicles and can affect the ovarian eggs. We know that the microwaves. . . can cause genetic damage. If you think of a young girl at school–she’s sitting here and she has the Wi-Fi sets transmitting straight through the uterus into the ovaries. If the young girl damages the ovarian eggs–and we’re not going to know this for another 15 years–if the ovarian eggs are damaged, these are irreparable. They can never ever be repaired. The mitochondrial DNA in girls is irreparable. So when that girl—if she has a daughter, that daughter will carry the genetic damage that has been caused by the microwaves and when she has a daughter that daughter will carry the same disease and her daughter and her daughter. . . . So we are now not saying we are risking this generation–we are risking the future generations of all the children in the world from genetic damage. . . .”
The fight by residents of Chino Hills, California, to prevent Edison from installing high voltage transmission lines within 40 feet (in some cases) of their homes and the issues raised: the EMF they emit, the solid studies of childhood leukemia, the efforts (unethical) by the utility industry to prove otherwise are like “cousins” to the “smart” meter issue.
Another aspect in common with “smart” meters is the irony because the high voltage transmission lines that they are erecting are to carry “renewables” (in Chino Hills’ case, for wind)–so the very reason to erect these polluting high voltage towers is to supposedly be “green.” However, it’s what the mayor of Chino Hills, Ed Graham, calls “politically correct [as opposed to, in fact] green energy.”
We have a similar situation with the utilities’ expensive, wasteful and polluting smart meter roll out. Millions of analog meters built to last for decades tossed in the dump; replaced by soon to be obsolete digital “smart” meters. Federal funds and rate payer hikes to finance it. Nothing inherently green about it, but rather a behavioral modification program from the 1930’s (they raise your rates; you use less energy). Energizing our airways with completely man-made RF radiation which didn’t exist 100 years ago. A kind of radiation which, as Jerry L. Phillips, (whose team was the first to find DNA damage from RF exposure) says, comes out of “machines” and has biological effects on human cells. A kind of radiation which can cause cancer directly by damaging DNA, and can cause cancer indirectly and other serious effects (such as pre-senile dementia) by weakening the blood brain barrier. Is this conservation or extinction?
Here is an introduction and then the letter, re-printed in full, from the Mayor of Chino Hills about their situation. Their city has spent more than 2 million dollars fighting this.
***
Last June the Mayor of Chino Hills sent this Open Letter to Southern California Edison and the CPUC. It is in regards to Southern California Edison using a long held easement to install high voltage transmission lines close to Chino Hills residents’ homes which will carry energy generated by wind. Wrote Chino Hills Mayor Ed Graham: “Never did anyone expect that a CPUC review process would allow the construction of poles that climb to nearly 200 feet in a 150-foot easement, much less that they would be approved to carry double-circuit 500 kV power lines – a level of energy unheard of in residential neighborhoods throughout the entire United States.”
The CPUC, which seems bloated with industry insiders, voted on February 1, 2012, to approve a proposal which will allow PG&E customers in California (see note*) who want analog meters to pay a $75 dollar upfront “install” fee (which you will be charged even if your analog is already installed) and an ongoing ten dollar monthly fee –this despite almost two hours of public comments from over 60 speakers who spoke against the fees as a form of extortion. (The analog option does not help those who live above, as was the case for one speaker, a bank of 42 meters; or those still made sick by their neighbors’ nearby smart meters.) As one speaker said “We should be a smart meter free state.”
“Some people may never be satisfied,” Commissioner Ferron later said. This may especially be the case when they realize the CPUC has given their utility company authority to charge them a bundle of new fees to keep what they already had (analogs) in the first place.
President Peevey used his time at the podium to talk about how the White House had sent a “technology emissary,” Aneesh Chopra, to California just a few days prior; and to promote the benefits of “smart” meters” to “empower consumers.”
Virtually every speaker in the room (other than the commissioners) spoke against “Smart” meters, and even people who came to talk about other matters put in a word against “smart” meters. The absence of any pro smart meter speakers seemed to concern Commissioner Simon as he later used some of his podium time to urge “beneficiaries” of the wireless technology to speak up, complaining that the argument has been “one-sided.”
Although those of us on the delay list are grateful that we will not have to steel ourselves to either accept a carcinogen on our own property or be threatened with jail or power shut off if we don’t, there are still many issues with the ruling (particularly for those living near multiple meters) which will leave “some people” not only dissatisfied, but unable to benefit from it. As one speaker pointed out, people with health conditions are often on disability and can’t afford to pay other people’s opt out. Their neighbors may even be too poor to pay their own. Even for those with more resources, it could cost thousands of dollars to opt out.
Some of this dissatisfaction that Commissioner Ferron was referring to spilled over after the vote when people were leaving. Some speakers cried “shame” and broke into a group chant: We Say No Fee. Charge the Utility! One woman—in grey pants, with a long green scarf knotted over a black sweater and long blonde hair—who earlier had told about her neighbor’s baby who had leukemia and how the mother had been exposed to smart meter radiation during her pregnancy—walked to the front of the room and looked up at the commissioners.
“I’m an advocate for my cancer smart meter baby. She is crying to you. This is a crime against humanity. This is a crime against humanity.”
“She’s right!” someone yelled.
“Let’s go.” Peevey said in his brusque voice
“You should be ashamed of yourself. Crime against humanity!”
“Could we have a little security here, please?” Peevey called out as she walked away, joining the crowd massed against the open doorway, slowly shuffling out.
The camera fixed on Peevey sitting at the podium (brown suit, black curtains behind his chair)—as he and the other commissioners waited for the smart meter people to leave. Another voice, female, could be heard “I’m going to have to leave my house. I’ll have to leave America because of you guys. Thank you. I’ve been sick for two years cause of you guys. I’ve explained it from every single angle and you guys still don’t get it.” The words floated like some fly around Peevey’s white haired pink faced head.
Commissioner Simon said something (which the audio did not pick up); and the three commissioners at the table (Peevey, Simon and Sandoval) burst into laughter. Somebody later turned off the mike. Then when the last of the smart meter speakers had finally made it through the doorway, the mike was turned back on.
“Close the doors!” Peevey said.
“I’m pleased,” Peevey now said, addressing the audience, “to bring this next item before you today. . . ”
***
**Note: The ruling is officially only for PG&E customers. We have been told by the CPUC public advisor that what goes for PG&E will also go for SCE and SDG&E.
“I think it was very very significant that Obama sent out I believe it was the head of the department of energy Chopra to speak to the CPUC on this. They’re really worried about what is going and they know that we have a momentum here that people aren’t going to take getting microwaved in their own homes. . . . We need to go to Obama. We need to go to the FCC. We need to demand exposure standards which are based on biology not mythology or whatever it is they’re basing them on–because they’re not basing them on the truth.” –Angela Flynn, Green Evolution
“The designation of group 2bis radio frequency electromagnetic fields–that is unspecified as to sourceso the group 2b classification would have broad applicability to sources with this type of emissions”–-Jonathan Samet, MD, Chairman of the Working Group of 31 Scientists for The WHO/International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) which, on May 31, 2011, declared radio frequency electromagnetic fields as a class 2B (possible) carcinogen.
The FCC requires warning signs, but somehow the utility companies must have forgotten to install them. Thank goodness, we have these dedicated, concerned citizens to help out.
From FCC Website: WHAT IS THE FCC’S POLICY ON RADIOFREQUENCY WARNING SIGNS?
Radiofrequency warning or “alerting” signs should be used to provide information on the presence of RF radiation or to control exposure to RF radiation within a given area. . . Meaningful information should be placed on the sign advising affected persons of: (1) the nature of the potential hazard (i.e., high RF fields), (2) how to avoid the potential hazard, and (3) whom to contact for additional information. . . . Signs should be located prominently in areas that will be readily seen by those persons who may have access to an area where high RF fields are present.
Three Items: Important CPUC Meeting this Wednesday: Please Write to Commissioners; 2. Physicians’ Group Recommends Moratorium on Smart Meters; 3. Santa Cruz Health Department Report on Smart Meters.
1. CPUC Meeting This Wednesday, February 1, 2012, the CPUC will be voting on a smart meter opt-out for PG&E (The CPUC advisor has said this ruling will ultimately apply to SCE and SDG&E customers, also) which will allow ratepayers to have an analog meter if they agree to pay an initial upfront and an ongoing monthly fee. The current delay list will be dismantled and if you do not sign up to pay, you will have your analog removed and a smart meter installed.
Most of us in Southern California are unable to attend the San Francisco meeting. However, we can give feedback by contacting the CPUC commissioners and the CPUC judge directly via e-mail and telling them There Should be No Fee Whatsoever:
A) The utilities have already received billions of dollars in federal stimulus funds (your taxpayer money) plus approval to pass on costs of the Smart Meter infrastructure (including profits for their corporate shareholders) to ratepayers for years to come.
B) The utility monopolies should not be allowed to price gouge or double dip by charging ratepayers (who already paid) twice for their analogs. If anything, as one person said, since Smart Meters cost $300 a piece, instead of being charged, analog customers should get a credit.
C) The fees discriminate against the poor, those on limited income and the disabled. Some say they are a form of extortion because they require those who suffer health effects or have medical implants to “pay up” to protect their health. Such fees may also be in violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act.
D) The CPUC should not only reject opt-out fees for electric “smart” meters, but for all “smart” utility (gas and water) meters. No resident should have to pay, for example, to stop SoCalGas from attaching a worthless wireless radiation emitting device to their gas meters.
Below are the e-mail addresses of the CPUC commissioners and Judge Amy Yip Kikugawa (who had been asking the utilities some interesting questions, such as to provide disclosure about the pulsed radiation “smart” meters emit) Please send them feedback. Not only will the Northern California ruling affect all of California, but people across the country (and even internationally) are watching closely.
2. Physicians’ Group (American Academy of Environmental Medicine) Adopts Resolution Against Smart Meters: Says Cindy Sage, “This represents the first national physicians’ group to look in-depth at wireless health risks; and to advise the public and decision-makers about preventative public health actions that are necessary.” See here to read their letter.
3. The Santa Cruz Health Department report on Health Risks of Smart Meters (scroll to page 9 of this document). See also Susan Brinchman’s article on this in La Mesa Patch. She observes it is “the first California County Health Department smart meter report.” (She quotes most of the report in her article, also). One other note about it. I was talking to a statistics professor about the Inverse Square Law. According to the diagram in this report’s addendum (page 17) people who sleep with a smart meter on the other side of the wall less than a foot away (we have residences like this in Turtle Rock, unfortunately and probably throughout the city) could be exposed to 450 times (whole body exposure) higher radiation than that from a cell phone. And it’s not just the length of a phone call. It’s all night long while they are sleeping (cells are more vulnerable to RF when we sleep).
People often say–don’t worry about the radiation because the inverse square law means that distance is your friend. However, in this situation the inverse square law works against the person as being this close to a smart meter is at least two feet closer than the diagram–that is the typical distance they used to measure smart meter RF impact.
Cindy Sage: "We are currently dealing with outdated public exposure limits." Sage shows a bar graph chart which compares the FCC limits versus the actual level where bio-effects take place.
"The relationship was really very cordial and really stress free. . .but only until we started generating data"-- Jerry Philips. His team was the first to find DNA damage from RF field exposure. See also an excellent audio interview here
Stop Smart Meters Irvine 