DEMAND THAT SEATTLE

BAN SMART METERS AND 5G,

AND TURN OFF WI-FI IN SCHOOLS

May 4, 2018

 

Read the latest version online at:
www.JamesRobertDeal.org/demand-that-seattle-ban-smart-meters-and-5G

 

Read May 4 Press Release

 

Jenny Durkan, Seattle Mayor
P.O. Box 94749
Seattle WA 98124-4749
Also sent by email to: jenny.durkan@seattle.gov

 

Seattle City Council
P.O. Box 94749
Seattle WA 98124-4749
Also sent by email to:

Lisa.herbold@seattle.gov; bruce.harrell@seattle.gov; kshama.sawant@seattle.gov; rob.johnson@seattle.gov; debora.juarez@seattle.gov; mike.obrien@seattle.gov; sally.bagshaw@seattle.gov; teresa.mosqueda@seattle.gov; lorena.gonzalez@seattle.gov;

 

Seattle City Light

Attention: Jim Baggs, Acting General Manager and CEO

P.O. Box 34023
Seattle WA 98124-4023

Also sent by email to: SCL_CityLight_PDR@seattle.gov

 

Timothy Harris, Assistant Seattle City Attorney
701 Fifth Avenue, Suite 2050
Seattle WA 98104-7097
Also sent by email to: timothy.harris@seattle.gov   

 

Governor Jay Inslee
PO Box 40002
Olympia, WA 98504-0002

 

Bob Ferguson
Washington Attorney General
1125 Washington Street SE
PO Box 40100
Olympia WA  98504-0100

 

Sid Logan, Kathy Vaughn, Toni Olson, Commissioners
Snohomish County PUD
PO Box 1107
Everett, WA 98206-1107

 

Michael Kreidler
Insurance Commissioner
PO Box 40257
Olympia WA 98504-0257
Also sent by email to: Licinfo@oic.wa.gov
Telephone: 360-725-7144

 

Also sent to all members of the Washington Legislature

 

To Our Representatives:

 

I write as attorney for the Coalition Against Smart Meters and 5G, formerly known as Hard Wired For Safety, a 501(c)(3) non-profit corporation.

 

The Coalition opposes so-called advanced or smart meters and 5G technology and informs politicians, the public, insurance commissioners, and lawyers, regarding their defects, the harms they cause to humans and other life forms, the damage they cause to property, their failure economically, their surveillance violations, their violation of trespass laws, their failure to qualify according existing regulations, and the refusal of insurance carriers to cover some or all damages caused by these technologies.

 

So-called advanced or smart meters and all electronic meters are a Consumer Protection Act case waiting to happen. These meters are going to create an enormous amount of political dissention. Our leaders would be wise to retreat from this defective and dangerous technology as soon as possible.

 

The Coalition urges Seattle and Seattle City Light to halt advanced meter deployment immediately and restore analog meters already deployed. There is already sufficient evidence to support such a policy.

 

Oh, and one more thing, smart meters explicitly violate several Washington laws.

 

∞∞∞∞

 

Electromagnetic radiation is invisible, and so it is easy to assume that it does us no harm. However, before jumping to this conclusion there are numerous questions that public officials must answer.

 

I will therefore be sending Seattle and Seattle City Light a separate document containing requests for public disclosure regarding so-called advanced meters and to electronic meters in general. In these Requests are the many questions which the city has failed to ask and answer.

 

Before presenting my Requests, I will first give you necessary background information regarding these meters and point out their many flaws.

 

For general background, I invite you to watch the video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gRR_u3oooHw.

 

For background information on the cumulative cancer causing nature of cell phone radiation – in the same band and intensity as smart meters – watch the video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BwyDCHf5iCY

 

For background information explaining why so-called advanced meters catch fire, watch the video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7MfiNYzdi24

 

To make it easier to follow this and other links, visit www.JamesRobertDeal.org/demand-that-seattle-ban-smart-meters-and-5G.  

 

To read several other documents pertaining to these issues, please visit www.JamesRobertDeal.org/Smart-Meters.

 

∞∞∞∞

 

I will summarize the main points here and develop them below:

 

We are being subjected to excessive and ever-increasing levels of electromagnetic radiation from so-called smart meters, cell towers, cordless phones, microwave ovens, security software, baby monitors, Wi-Fi, and the forthcoming 5G. It can take years for radiation to cause cancer. The effect is cumulative, and the long term effect of such continuous radiation is disease and death for many in the upcoming years and decades.

 

The latest and worst of all is 5G operating in the super high megahertz range, just below the 90 GHz of the Army’s Active Denial System weapon.

 

Electronic meters, including the so-called advanced meters, are not grounded, whereas the analog meters they replace are well grounded.

 

Electronic meters contain puny surge protection. Analog meters include a superior, built in spark gap surge protector.

 

Electronic meters are much more likely to catch fire than the all-metal analog meters they replace.

 

Electronic meters utilize a cheap, switched mode power supply (SMPS) to regulate voltage, which produces harmful dirty electricity.

 

So-called advanced meters, those with have the communicating and surveillance function enabled, violate privacy by collecting our private information.

 

So-called advanced meters, those with have the communicating and surveillance function enabled, violate privacy by making it easy for hackers to hack into our homes, schools, and businesses.

 

Electronic meters cost much more than analog meters. They wear out in seven years, whereas analog meters last 40 years.

 

All electronic meters consume a significant amount of electricity just to operate. They are always on. They are computers and have circuit boards. They are not accurate. They do not measure watts directly. They measure voltage and amperage peaks and average them. Accuracy depends on weather. They build up heat.

 

Analog meters consume only a tiny amount of electricity to rotate their aluminum wheels as they accurately measure watts consumed regardless of weather. They consume no electricity to operate if no electricity is being consumed in the building. They are sometimes off. They do not build up heat.

 

Advanced meters in which communicating functions are enabled consume even more electricity as they send, receive, and relay electromagnetic information thousands of times daily. They too are always on.

 

So-called advanced meters increase total system wide electricity consumption. So-called advanced meters increase total monthly bills for customers.

 

The savings to be had from putting meter readers out of work will be far exceeded by the cost of the new meters, the cost of replacing the meters more frequently, the increased consumption of electricity, cost of liability insurance and the cost of covering uninsured liabilities, and the damage to wiring, appliances, and equipment.

 

So-called advanced meters will not reduce costs for utility companies and will not increase profits or surpluses for private and publicly owned utility companies. Advanced meters are an economic goof-up on both a short-term and long-term basis.

 

Washington courts say that easements cannot impose a “greater burden” than “originally contemplated”. The utility easements that we and our predecessors granted to utility companies contemplated a grounded, surge protected, and fireproof meter, and one which did collect and broadcast our private information. Therefore, smart meters exceed the scope of the easements granted, and imposing them on unwilling customers is a trespass and an assault.

 

Both fee owners and tenants are beneficiaries of easements and can therefore sue for trespass and assault on their own.

 

Owners of one to four unit homes can opt out, and their renters can opt if the owner consents. But those in apartments with five or more units cannot opt out. Schools, businesses, and churches cannot opt out. Those with solar roofs cannot opt out. Policies which allow some customers to opt out of having electronic meters but arbitrarily deny that right to other consumers discriminate in ways which are unconstitutional. Effectively, such large opt-out fees, which are not rationally related to real costs, constitute an illegal form of discrimination against the poor and people of color, because they are unable to afford these extra fees.

 

The electronic meters in general, communicating and non-communicating, are poorly designed and engineered. They are generally inferior to the analog meters they are replacing.

 

Seattle is going the wrong way down a dead-end street, wasting enormous amounts of money to install inferior meters. The money being wasted should instead be spent to install fiber optic connections to every home, school, and business.

 

Ironically, for 5G meters to work, they must be connected by fiber. It would make more sense to run fiber a few more feet to homes, businesses, and schools. Those who still want through the air connections can turn on their inside Wi-Fi. 

 

5G will die of its own weight. First, because unsightly 5G cell towers will be required at every street corner. Second, because 5G will be used mostly to transmit video, which is better watched on a hard-wired connection. Third, because each 5G cell tower will have to be connected to fiber optic for 5G to work.

 

So-called advanced meters create a new security hole into each home or other building in order to collect usage information. It is possible to collect billing information without doing it through an advanced meter. Utility companies could make available for free a software program that would allow consumers to measure their usage in real time and report it automatically to utility companies. It is already available on Amazon for $129. Plug it into your panel and link it to your computer and then report usage automatically every month.

 

So-called smart meters are one of many profitable frauds being perpetrated on the public. They can be perpetrated because our agencies have been taken captive by the industries they regulate, through campaign donations and the revolving door. We have a system where bribery of politicians is legal as long as it is fully disclosed. I have proposed a way to take the money out of politics and eliminate the revolving door. See www.jamesrobertdeal.org/election-and-campaign-finance-reform.

 

So-called advanced meters emit – on a constant basis – large amounts of electromagnetic radiation of the type which is carcinogenic in large doses over short periods of time and carcinogenic in smaller doses over long periods of time.

 

Home insurance policies may or may not cover damage from electrical surges. The standard commercial policy specifically excludes loss from surges.

 

No insurance policy covers harms caused by electromagnetic radiation. This means that Seattle City Light and the companies which sell smart meter technology will have no coverage when they are sued for the cancers that will be epidemic after decades of cumulative exposure.

 

Smart meters fail to comply with the National Fire Protection Association NFPA Rule 70, with National Electrical Code NEC Section 240.4, and with National Electrical Safety Code (NESC) Sections 92D and 215B. Washington law adopts in full all portions of the NEC and the NESC. See WAC 296-46B-010 and WAC 296-45-045. Smart meters are therefore illegal.

 

All of us are will be harmed by excess electromagnetic radiation in the long term, although most of us are able to ignore it in the short term. We take medication to mask the symptoms. Some people really are electro-sensitive in the short term. The installation of smart meters and the excessive broadcasting of microwave radiation and the creation of excessive amounts of stray current is a callous denial of their condition. The hypersensitive are the canaries in the coal mine, a warning that we too may soon be sickened. We should pay attention to their reactions and not dismiss them as malingerers.

 

The issue is not just smart meters or cell phones or Wi-Fis, or cell towers, or microwave ovens, or portable phones, or baby monitors, or security monitoring systems, or the increasing number of smart appliances in our homes, schools, and workplaces, or 5G. Instead, the issue is the total amount of electromagnetic radiation to which we are being subjected.

 

No agency is adding up the total exposure coming from all these many sources of electromagnetic radiation. This is because hacks from the telecommunications industry occupy top posts in government, and they don’t want to know.

 

Seattle should stop the rollout of so-called advanced meters, replace those already installed with analog meters, and ban deployment of 5G.

 

Seattle should demand that manufacturers of cell phones, tablets, and other through the air connecting devices also be capable of being plugged into ethernet cables when at home, school, or work so that electromagnetic radiation from these devices can be reduced and eliminated.

 

Many devices produce stray current of many wavelengths and wave forms, and the neutral line is inadequate to carry all this stray current back to the generation source. Smart meters dramatically increase levels of stray current. The current practice is to dump this excess current into the earth, letting the current flow back to the source through the earth. This electrifies the surface layers of the earth pretty much everywhere. Seattle City Light should increase the carrying capacity of the neutral wire all the way back to the generation source and quit pumping waste electricity into the earth.

 

Seattle should accept responsibility for eliminating stray current throughout the electrical system. And that includes inside homes. Filters are relatively inexpensive, but it takes expertise to select the right filter to eliminate the many different wave forms.

 

Variable frequency drives in well pumps and LNG plants should be eliminated or modified, because they are among the worst producers of stray current.

 

Seattle City Light should take a comprehensive approach to providing safe and confidential power and connectivity.

 

I will expand on these points below.

 

∞∞∞∞

 

The meters in question are commonly referred to as “smart meters”. The technical term is “advanced meters”. The advanced meters or smart meters I refer to herein include the meters that the city of Seattle is installing throughout its service area.

 

Advanced meters are sometimes referred to as AMI meters, which is short for Advanced Metering Infrastructure. AMI includes not only the meters but also the wireless mesh network, which relays information from one broadcasting and receiving meter to the next, and on down the line, bathing the entire city in electromagnetic radiation.

 

I will also discuss electronic meters in general, a broader term which includes both the communicating and the non-communicating opt out versions of the advanced meters and also includes the many non-communicating GE and Itron digital meters that have been installed since around 2000. Although these GE meters are not of the broadcasting version, they are only slightly less defective than the so-called advanced meters.

 

I will refer to the so-called advanced meters and the GE digital meters together as “electronic meters”, in contrast to the all-metal, fireproof, well grounded, surge protected, electromechanical analog meters.

 

∞∞∞∞

 

I predict that the mayor and Council will reverse directions on smart meters. If you do so, you will not be the first. In New Hampshire the law is that people must opt in to receive smart meters.

 

The Public Service Commission of New Mexico has banned smart meters. Read the following summary from Arther Firstenberg:

The Public Regulation Commission has denied PNM’s (a private utility company) application for Smart Meters.

 

The plan presented in the Application does not provide a net public benefit and it does not promote the public interest,”

 

wrote the Commission.

The Commission accepted the Hearing Examiner’s recommended decision without alteration. It ruled that:

• PNM did not demonstrate that smart meters will save money.

• PNM did not demonstrate that smart meters will produce energy efficiency.

• PNM did not show that customers want smart meters.

• PNM did not evaluate alternatives.

• PNM did not say how it would protect customer data privacy.

• Cybersecurity issues need to be addressed.
• 125 good, high-paying jobs would be lost.
• Proposed opt-out fees were unreasonable.
• There was insufficient public input.
• There was insufficient response by PNM to public objections.

 

EVIDENCE ABOUT HEALTH EFFECTS was discussed at length:

 

“Customers who have strong feelings about the health effects of the meters should be allowed to protect their stated health concerns without a prohibitively high cost.”

The decision goes on to state:

 

The conditions of the portion of the population who believe they are electromagnetically sensitive deserve acknowledgment and consideration as decisions are made regarding the implementation of an AMI Project. Accommodations could include reasonable opt-out provisions and fees and perhaps the selection of technologies that minimize the impacts on such people. Such accommodations may be desirable to minimize health risks to customers and address the needs and preferences of PNM’s customers. These are issues that can and should be addressed in a public input process of the sort PNM stated in its 2012 Report that it would conduct before bringing a smart meter proposal to the Commission for approval.”

 

The Washington Utilities and Transportation issued a ruling on April 10, 2018, on the limited issue of opt out fees and rights to opt out. While the Commission has jurisdiction only over privately owned utilities, and not over public utility districts, its rulings have persuasive value.

 

The Commission stated its opposition to one-time, up front opt out fees:

 

“In the event the company is replacing all meters within its inventory as part of its advanced meter deployment, there should be no additional cost for procuring a non-communicating digital meter assigned to an individual opt-out customer, since the entire customer base is receiving new meters. As with the costs of advanced meters, the costs of all new meters, including non-communicating meters, should be spread across all customers.

 

Regarding continuing monthly opt-out fees, the Commission expressed general opposition, urging that self-reporting be utilized in conjunction with meter reading annually to correct any errors. The Commission said:

 

“… [W]e find that there is significant potential to either eliminate or significantly mitigate meter reading expenses through the application of alternative meter reading schedules (e.g., customer self-reads, or bi-monthly, quarterly, or annual reads with budget billing).

“… [W]e expect companies to minimize the amount of any recurring fees for customers choosing to opt out while bearing in mind the Commission’s long-standing cost of service principles, including cost causation.

“We strongly prefer that the companies employ budget billing … for opt-out program participants. Under this structure, meter reads would be performed annually with a true-up to capture any positive or negative balance ….”

 

“… [T]he Commission nevertheless prefers that companies allow customers to retain the existing meter — a company’s standard meter at the time it was installed — until that meter fails.

 

The fact that the Commission mentions the following item instead of ignoring would indicate that the Commision might like the New Hampshire policy. The Commission said:

 

“…[T]he state of New Hampshire enacted legislation mandating that utilities require customers to opt in when deploying advanced meters ….”

 

The Commission repeats falsehoods that no doubt came from the vendors of smart technology, saying that utilities want to switch to electronic meters because:

 

“analog meters are no longer in production or supported by their manufacturers, and  analog meters are known to slow down with age, resulting in lost revenue ….”

 

In fact, new analog meters are available from China for under $50. Perfectly good reconditioned and warrantied analog meters are available from Florida for $25 or less.

 

Another defect in the Commission ruling was that it was not clarified as to whether tenants will be able to opt out if their landlord does not agree. In Seattle they cannot opt out without the approval of their landlord. The Commission did not address whether tenants in buildings of five units or more would be able to opt out (in Seattle they cannot), whether condo dwellers can opt out (which is not clear), and whether schools, businesses, and other buildings can opt out (in Seattle they cannot).

 

The Commission parroted the following erroneous statement from the wireless propagandists:

 

“A foundational technology critical to grid modernization is advanced metering technologies….”

 

Smart meters do not facilitate a smart overall grid. The grid does not need to know granular details about how much energy is being used by each appliance in each home in order to balance loads. Readings from sub-stations are adequate for that purpose. The vendors of smart meters have falsely linked their defective product to the smart grid, by falsely referring to it as “smart”.

 

∞∞∞∞

 

Port Angeles residents voiced repeated objections to a smart meter project there, citing health concerns over the electromagnetic energy employed by the wireless devices. The City Council backed out of a smart meter installation contract and paid a $1.8 million settlement with Mueller Systems LLC to end the program. Seattle follow suit and terminate its smart meter program.

 

∞∞∞∞

 

So-called advanced meters and AMI mesh networks are the product of the Great Recession of 2008. The Obama Administration was looking for “shovel ready” projects on which to spend government money. The aim was to spend a lot of money in order to stimulate the economy. Said advanced meters were claimed to be shovel ready, which was and remains completely untrue. The Obama administration and the Department of Energy were swindled into funding the installation of these inferior meters, paying utility companies part of the cost of their installation.

 

Why would our Department of Energy finance installation of inferior devices? The explanation is that all our agencies, both on the federal and on the state level, have been captured to varying degrees by the industries they regulate. The wireless and electronic meter industry donate to elected officials. In return elected officials appoint pro-industry hacks to head our agencies. These hacks get big bonuses before they leave their corporate jobs. After a term at relatively low pay working for federal and state agencies, they return to their corporate jobs and again get large salaries and big bonuses.

 

The revolving door should be closed. Lobbyists should be banned from connecting elected officials with money. Elected officials should not be allowed to accept contributions from industries which lobby them. Campaigns should be financed publicly. Arguments that public financing would be too expensive fail to understand that the current arrangement is many times more expensive than public financing would be. See www.jamesrobertdeal.org/election-and-campaign-finance-reform.

 

Seattle and Seattle City Light should have known that that AMI was an inferior, defective, and harmful technology. Maybe they were taking large campaign donations from wireless connected donors and were paid to look the other way. Maybe Seattle City Light was being administered by former employees of wireless industries, who obtained their positions through the revolving door. Both parties have been corrupted through so called pay for play. Many of our progressive politicians are not green politicians. They are progressive only on social issues.

 

So-called advanced meters were sold to the Obama administration and the Department of Energy and Seattle City Light with the representation that they are superior when they are not grounded and have insufficient surge protection and are for these and other reasons inferior.

 

So-called advanced meters were sold with the misrepresentation that they would make possible the minute by minute monitoring by consumers of their electrical consumption. However, the mesh network is unable to transmit usage data quickly enough for users to monitor their usage in real time. Only a wired connection could accomplish that. Instead, advanced meter feedback regarding usage is only made available on a next-day basis, and that is useless for giving feedback to customers as to how much electricity they are using at any given time.

 

So-called smart meters were sold with the representation that they would make the “smart grid” more effective by helping to balance loads over large areas. However, the minute by minute data from advanced meters are delivered too slowly to help with load balancing. The overall system does not need information on each user to balance loads. Modern automated load sensing equipment at the substation level are sufficient for that purpose.

 

∞∞∞∞

 

In connecting our devices to the internet, there are two industry factions which both compete and cooperate. On the one hand are companies selling hard wired connections, such as twisted pair copper DSL and coaxial fiber optic. On the other hand, are the non-wired, through the air connections such as cell towers, cell phones, satellite dish, advanced meters, and Wi-Fis.

 

While Wi-Fi is usually connected to a hard-wired source, it broadcasts through the air in home, schools, and businesses. 5G will broad cast wirelessly from antennas on every block, but each antenna will be connected via fiber.

 

Utility companies are wasting hundreds of millions of dollars deploying advanced meters, mesh networks, and 5G antennas. This money would be better spent completing fiber optic connections to every building. Through the air connections should be minimized because of the harmful nature of microwave radiation.

 

It should be possible to plug our cell phones into hard wired ethernet cable when we are at home, at work, or at school, or even at an internet café. We should then be able to switch our phones to airplane mode and dial and talk, surf, watch movies, and game on them while they are hard wired. The fact that it is impossible to dial and talk on a plugged in cell phone shows just how uncreative cell phone manufacturers are.

 

We should develop safer frequencies and lower intensities for connecting when a hard-wired connection is not available.

 

Electromagnetic radiation from cell phones is multiplied many times when cell phones are used inside cars. Vehicles should have exterior antennas to receive and transmit, and those inside vehicles should be able to plug into a connection to those exterior antennas and set their phones on airplane mode, thus reducing exposure to electromagnetic radiation.

 

∞∞∞∞

 

The electromagnetic spectrum is important and should be made use of. We are not Luddites. We are not opposed to better technology just to protect the jobs of meter readers. We are opposed to the reckless and rapidly increasing overuse of electromagnetic radiation at harmful frequencies, at harmful energy levels, and in far too many places.

 

Electromagnetic radiation from so-called advanced meters straddles the radio and microwave bands and is harmful to health. The International Agency for Research on Cancer, a branch of the World Health Organization, ruled in 2014 that the radiofrequency radiation produced by cell phones, which operate at the same frequency as so-called advanced meters, is a type 2B possible human carcinogen. The IARC finding, as summarized by Scientific American is that:

 

… as the thousands of rats in the new study were exposed to greater intensities of RF radiation, more of them developed rare forms of brain and heart cancer that could not be easily explained away, exhibiting a direct dose–response relationship. Overall, the incidence of these rare tumors was still relatively low, which would be expected with rare tumors in general, but the incidence grew with greater levels of exposure to the radiation.

 

A Type 1A carcinogen is a confirmed human carcinogen, such as arsenic. A Type 1B carcinogen is a probable human carcinogen. A Type 2A carcinogen is a confirmed carcinogen in animals and therefore a probable human carcinogen. A Type 2B carcinogen is a probable carcinogen in animals and therefore a possible carcinogen in humans. These four categories are defined differently by different authorities.

 

The World Health Organization is a conservative, pro-business organization. For the WHO to make this admission regarding the harmful nature of electromagnetic radiation should then be considered believable and even an understatement of the problem. There was one member of the IARC who wanted to classify cell phone radiation as a probable human carcinogen instead of just a possible human carcinogen, however, he was bumped from the decision-making panel.

 

Further, the National Institutes of Health National Toxicology Program issued findings in 2016, which are summarized as follows by the Environmental Health Trust:

 

The study found adverse effects after long term exposure to cell phone radiation:

 

• Increased incidences of glioma (a rare, aggressive and highly malignant brain cancer) as well as schwannoma (a rare tumor of the nerve sheath) of the heart were found in both sexes of rats, but reached statistical significance only in males.
• Increased incidences of rare, proliferative changes in glial cells of the brain and in Schwann cells (nerve sheath) in the heart of both sexes of rats, while not a single unexposed control animal developed these precancerous changes.
• DNA damage was induced with both modulations of radiofrequency radiation (RFR) in both rats and mice (mixed results in tissues and brain regions).
• Results from this study clearly show that biological impacts occur at non-thermal exposures like those that take place from cell phones today.

 

The National Toxicology Program issued a stronger statement in 2018. In rats the NTP stated that it found evidence of carcinogenic activity at 900 megahertz based on the incidences of

 

malignant schwannoma in the heart …, adenoma or carcinoma (combined) in the prostate gland, malignant glioma and benign or malignant granular cell tumors in the brain, adenoma of the pars distalis in the pituitary gland, pheochromocytoma (benign, malignant, or complex combined) in the adrenal medulla ….

 

The U.S. National Toxicology Program Expert Panel on Cell Phone Radiation released its decision on March 28, 2018, saying that there is “clear evidence” linking cell phone radiation to the development of cancers in rats, finding “an association between both heart and brain cancers and cell phone radiation in large-scale animal study”. Bear in mind that everything said regarding cell phones applies also to smart meters.

 

Such conclusions regarding radiation in cell phone bands applies equally to so-called advanced meters because the meters and cell phones operate at overlapping frequencies.

 

The harms caused by electromagnetic radiation are cumulative over time. As our total lifetime dose of electromagnetic radiation increases, the incidence of cancer increases at a parallel rate. Researchers refer to the harms from electromagnetic radiation as being “dose-response dependent” or “exposure dependent”. As the dose goes up, the harm goes up in a linear manner.

 

It is harder to prove cancer causation in humans than in animals because you cannot put humans in cages and expose them to X levels of microwave radiation for X hour per day for X days. However, the case has now become conclusive. Electromagnetic radiation in the cell phone bands and up should be reclassified from possible human carcinogens to probable and even confirmed carcinogens in humans.

 

We tend to give the benefit of the doubt to big cash flow businesses instead of to human health concerns, and this is another indication that agencies have been subverted by the industries they regulate.

 

The carcinogenic effect is not immediate. Not all people will contract cancer from this radiation. But many will. Cancer may not strike until our 50s or 60s. If we dramatically reduce exposure to electromagnetic radiation, we would dramatically reduce the harm.

 

The latest example is John McCain who developed glioblastoma where he had long held his cell phone on the left side of his face.

 

Further, radiation in the cell phone bands causes damage to mitochondria. Citing numerous authorities, Dr. Joseph Mercola says:

 

The primary pathology behind cellphone damage is not related specifically to brain tumors, or even to cancer. Instead, the real danger lies in damage from the reactive nitrogen species peroxynitrites. Increased peroxynitrites from cellphone exposure will damage your mitochondria, and your brain is the most mitochondrial-dense organ in your body.

 

On top of all that is the very clearly validated fact that microwave radiation damages eyes. See Effects of microwave radiation on the eye: the occupational health perspective, which says:

 

Microwaves act on living tissue through two types of mechanisms, thermal and nonthermal. Lens opacities can be induced in experimental animals at relatively high intensities (power densities greater than 100 mW/cm2). For lower intensities, lens changes may depend on the cumulative dose. At “nonthermal intensities”, microwaves can act as a trigger and set off changes in the living tissues (e.g. Ca++ efflux). Some cataract-causing agents (alloxan and galactose) act synergistically with microwaves. Microwaves also accelerate formation of cataracts due to diabetes. The corneal endothelium can be damaged by microwaves alone or in combination with some drugs. Microwave degeneration of retinal nerve endings and a small increase in retinal permeability were also found in animals. The effect of long-term low-intensity microwave exposure on the human lens remains poorly understood. Several reports have implicated occupational microwave exposure as a factor in increasing the rate of lens aging and retinal injury in microwave workers. In Canada, recommended microwave exposure limits are set at 25 mW/cm2 for microwave workers and at 1 mW/cm2 for the general public (both averaged over 1 minute). The Australian microwave exposure safety standard (1985) recommends pre-and post-employment eye examinations for workers.

 

Numerous scientific journal articles spell out damage which electromagnetic radiation causes to DNA and RNA at numerous frequency levels including 50 Hz (dirty electricity), 900 MHz, 1.8 GHz, and 2.4 GHz.

 

There should now be no doubt that microwave radiation in the cell phone bands where smart meters function is harmful to health. To ignore this now proven link is negligent and even reckless.

 

Given that advanced meters and electronic meters do in fact cause bodily harm, the anticipation of that harm constitutes an assault. and the actual harm itself constitutes a battery. When such a tort is committed by federal, state, city, public utility, or publicly regulated private utility operating under color of law constitutes a violation of our constitutional rights under the 5th and 14th Amendments to the US Constitution.

 

∞∞∞∞

 

Around 3.0% of the population claim to be electro-sensitive. Electromagnetic radiation is gradually harming us all, but most of us do not perceive or can ignore the harm. The electro-sensitives do. Why are they sensitive? They may have been heavily overdosed in the past by radiation or perhaps chemicals and thus may have learned to identify the insult. When they are exposed again, they react.

 

Most academics discount electro-sensitivity, emphasizing that the electro-sensitive cannot easily tell when a source of microwave radiation, behind a nearby curtain, is turned on and off. This may be because there is a general background level of electromagnetic radiation, which is high and is increasing. This may be because it takes someone who is electro-sensitive to recover from his symptoms.

 

The work of Dr. Sam Milham, Dirty Electricity, is most convincing. Sam’s research is extensive and impossible to contradict. There are behavioral differences depending on the level of exposure to electromagnetic radiation.

Dr. Mercola evaluates Milham’s work and is supportive. He evaluates the findings of many researchers who outline the mechanisms by which the electro-sensitive perceive the harm.

 

It is a fact is that electromagnetic radiation does us harm in the long term. The only debate is whether some can perceive in the short term that they are being harmed. If we all are being slowly harmed by electromagnetic radiation, it should be no surprise that some can perceive the harm occurring.

 

If utility companies are going to install electronic meters, including so-called advanced meters, they should install protection for those who are electro-sensitive. Utility companies in Europe are installing microwave repelling paint, Faraday microwave insulation, and dirty energy filters for those who are electro-sensitive. Actually, utility companies should provide such protection to all customers – unless they quit irradiating us by terminating the smart meter program entirely.

 

Supporters of wireless technology ridicule those who question its safety, accusing them of being as tin foil hat conspiracy theorists.

There are false conspiracy theories and there are true conspiracy theories. There are some conspiracy theories which are crackpot. There are other conspiracy theories which are valid, and the over-radiation of us all has gone from conspiracy theory to conspiracy fact.

 

If advanced meters and 5G are implemented, we can expect many people to start wearing clothing and headgear which will repel microwave radiation. We are told to keep the door of our microwave oven closed, but when our cell phone and our refrigerator broadcast the same microwaves, we are told not to worry about it. The people who will don protective gear will not be crazy; they will be shielding themselves from harmful radiation.

 

Again, the savings achieved by putting meter readers out of work is counterbalanced by other costs, and the cost of protecting those harmed by the radiation is another big cost.

 

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The wireless spectrum should be used more sparingly, at safer wavelengths, at safer frequencies, and at safer energy intensities. Unsafe bands and intensities should not be used at all. The spectrum should not be filled up unnecessarily or over-used.

 

When wired connections are available, wired connections should always be used instead of wireless connections. When hard wired connections can be installed for a reasonable price, they should be installed. The radio spectrum should not be junked up with a cacophony of radiation from so-called advanced meters, their wireless mesh network, and the latest and worst offender, 5G.

 

If meters are to be made smart, they should be made smart by way of a hard-wired connection, not through the air.

 

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Smart meters are not necessary. They represent huge sums of money spent on infrastructure that provide no benefits or savings to the customer and which provide no net savings or increase in profits or surplus to utility companies.

 

Seattle City Light, for example, raised $100 million through a bond initiative and is wasting it to build a defective, uneconomic, and unhealthy advanced meter program. Instead utility companies should use the same money to extend fiber optic connections throughout their service area, as Mount Vernon has done, with a gigabyte up and a gigabyte down for $70 per month. High tech, heavy internet dependent companies are relocating to Mount Vernon for this reason. Once fast, hard wired internet connections are available, cell phone and tablet users should then be able to plug into them and perform all cell phone functions in airplane mode, without subjecting themselves to any radiation.

 

Seattle should ditch its current flawed meter program. If it wants electronic reporting of usage, it should provide customers with free software which they could use to monitor their own real time usage and automatically report usage to the utility companies. Advanced meters are completely unnecessary.

 

We are already flooded with radiation in the cell phone bands, whether from cell towers, cell phones, Wi-Fis, Bluetooth, microwave ovens, baby monitors, security devices, or portable phones. More radio and microwave radiation will come from the many new smart appliances being introduced as part of the foolish and reckless Internet of Things movement.

 

All of these radiation emitters are and will be chirping away at each other more and more, filling our streets, homes, schools, and work places with an ever-increasing jumble of many wavelengths, frequencies, and intensities 24 hours each day. The extent of harm from so many sources of microwave radiation has not been totaled up. The wireless industry does not want to know what the total is, and because the wireless industry controls our regulatory agencies, our agencies do not want to know. This approach is somewhere between negligence and recklessness.

 

The burden of proof regarding the safety of electromagnetic radiation should be on those who are shortening wavelengths, increasing frequencies, and increasing energy intensities, and not on those who are subject to being irradiated by them.

 

Most single-family homes, most apartments, and most places of business already have some hard wire connection available, such as twisted pair DSL telephone and coaxial cable fiber optic. Those connections should be used whenever possible, instead of wireless connections. Wireless connections should be used only as needed and at wavelengths, frequencies, and intensities that minimize harm, especially in relation to those who are electro-sensitive.

 

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Analog electromechanical meters provide a path to ground. Circuit breakers, power strips, and three-pronged plugged appliances all need a path to ground to do their job of providing protection. Analog meters provide that path to ground, whereas electronic meters do not.

 

Electronic meters fit into the same wall socket as analog meters, but they do not connect to the available path to ground. A meter that is not grounded is more prone allow voltage surges to enter the building and damage wiring and electrical equipment.

 

Analog meters contain a spark-gap surge protector that will divert most surges to ground and prevent them from entering the building. Spark-gap protection is far better than the puny varistor surge protection provided by electronic meters.

 

Spark gap protection is good, but it is better than the puny protection in electronic meters. It will not protect against a direct lightning strike. Such protection could cost many thousands of dollars. However, the spark gap surge protector in analog meters will protect against some strikes which would go right through a smart meter. A spark gap surge protector will protect against strikes which, for example, strike the ground hundreds of feet away and travel through the ground to the building. The spark gap surge protector in an analog meter will in many cases divert such indirect, ground travelling lightning strikes to ground, while electronic meters will catch fire, set fire to the building. They will allow typically 2,000 amps to surge into the building and fry electronics and wiring.

 

Lightning strikes are fairly rare in the Northwest. The most common cause of surges here is when there is a storm, when trees fall, and when wires get crossed. A spark gap surge protector will protect against voltage spikes from crossed wires, while the insufficient surge protector in an electronic meter will not.

 

As pointed out above, the most common form of surges in the Northwest is not from lightning strikes but from line surges caused by crossed wires. Line surges are common. They occur when a truck crashes into a pole or when there is a storm and a tree branch falls on two lines and the two lines come into contact. When lines cross, they can send more than the rated voltage to the transformer up on a neighborhood pole that feeds current out to individual buildings.

 

The line voltage at the poles is usually 7,200. The transformer on the pole is a simple conversion device. It steps voltage down from 7,200 to 240. There may be a ratio of 30 turns on the high voltage side to one turn on the stepped down side. (7,200 / 30 = 240) If wires are crossed, the input is doubled to 14,400, and this in turn doubles the output from 240 to 480 in an instant.

 

When the varistor in an electronic meter, which is rated for 300 volts, meets 480 volts, the substrate separates from the circuit board and explodes. A bridge of 480 volts or more crosses the remaining circuit board. The circuit boards are only rated for 12 volts DC, so the circuit board melts and catches fire. The surge passes into the home and into all electrical equipment.

 

A circuit board does not belong inside an electric meter. It is too fragile.

 

Surges also occur when power has gone down and comes back up. When many motors start up all at once, there is a large system-wide draw. This drops system voltage. The system sometimes over-reacts and increases voltage too much, creating a system wide surge. Again, varistors in electronic meters burn out. The meters explode and catch fire.

 

Some believe that circuit breakers in their panel will protect the building against strong surges from outside the building. This is not true. Circuit breakers in the panel only flip and provide protection when devices within the building are drawing too much current. They do not flip in response to surges coming from outside the building.

 

Electronic meters contain a varistor, which is also known as a metal oxide varistor or MOV. Varistors are added to electronic meters to remedy the fact that they lack a path to ground, and to cut down on the fires which electronic meters were causing.

 

The varistor is an absorption surge protector. It does not pass current to ground. It provides protection only up to 300 volts AC. Many smaller surges will occur, and the varistor will absorb them. However, small surges have a cumulative effect on the varistor. Small surges happen frequently due to substation switching and other utility operations. The point will come when a relatively small surge exhausts the varistor’s capacity. It will burn out. The meter will then catch on fire. Current will surge into the building and damage wiring and equipment.

 

Manufacturers of the varistors typically used in digital meters advise that they can survive only a certain number of small surges before they break down. A customer would never know when the varistor in his or her electronic meter is on the verge of breaking down and catching fire. 

 

Because electronic meters are not grounded and because their varistor surge protector is good only to 300 volts, and because they contain plastic and circuit boards, they will catch fire and in turn catch a building on fire. Google for “smart meter fires”.

 

When a digital meter blows, there is a loud bang and popping noises, followed by flickering lights and then a fire. A massive amount of current can enter the building, up to 2,000 amps. Say goodbye to your appliances, equipment, and wiring.

 

On the other hand, an analog meter is all metal. It has a rugged, fireproof Bakelite back plate. It contains no circuit board and no plastic. It does not catch fire.

 

Another problem with all so-called advanced meters is that they contain a remote disconnect switch. When there is a switch, there is a gap. When there is a gap, there can be an arc. An arc can cause a fire.

 

Electronic meters are computers masquerading as meters. Their inventors built a computer and called it a meter. It is a meter, but it is a defective meter. Electronic meters sit in the same socket as an analog meter, but they lack several of the most important features of analog meters.

 

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Knowledgeable electrical engineers tell me that smart meters fail to comply with the National Fire Protection Association NFPA Rule 70E and with National Electrical Code NEC Section 240.4.

 

NEC 240.4 says:

 

240.4 Protection of Conductors. Conductors, other than flexible cords, flexible cables, and fixture wires, shall be protected against overcurrent in accordance with their ampacities ….

 

A smart meter is one of many conductors in a building. Electricity goes through it. This rule says you shall not allow more current to run through a smart meter than it can handle. When trees fall and wires cross and voltage is doubled from 220 to 440, electronic meters with a varistor for surge protection rated at only 300 volts will explode. Then overcurrent will pass into the building, at up to 2,000 amps, which is the total amperage available from the typical neighborhood transformer. Say goodbye to your new refrigerator.

Knowledgeable electrical engineers maintain that so-called advanced meters fail to comply with the National Electrical Safety Code (NESC) Sections 92D and 215B.

 

Rule 92D states:

 

Ground connection points shall be arranged so that under normal circumstances there will be no objectionable flow of current over the grounding conductor.

 

Rule 215B states:

This rule prohibits the use of the earth normally as the sole conductor for any part of the supply circuit. … Objections of the use of the earth as a part of a supply circuit are made from both safety and supply stand points.

The terms “safety” and “supply stand points” are important. A ground rod at your home is the safety ground. This is bonded to the neutral wire inside your power panel. When you look at a typical feed line from the pole transformer, look for the silver looking wire that is wrapped together with two other black wires. This is the neutral supply circuit. 

 

Electricity runs in a circuit, from the generator miles away, to our homes, and then back to the generator. A hot wire flows outward and a neutral wire carries returning current back to the generator. In the early days of electricity, current made the full circuit. There was a connection every mile or so from the neutral wire to the ground in case of lightning or other surges.

Current leaves the generator at a steady 60 cycles per second. However, homes and businesses produce return electricity of many other and higher wavelengths, and these require return wires of greater capacity. In Europe the returning neutral wire is double the size of the outgoing wire, but in the United States we have not increased the size of the neutral wire in order to save money on wire. To complete the circuit and return current to the source, we run the current through the ground. Instead of once every mile, there is now a grounding rod on every telephone pole.

Smart meters produce enormous amounts of non–60 cycle voltages and current of many different wave lengths and wave forms. This ranges from oscillating voltage swings of 50 millivolts up to 90 volts, with frequency of oscillations from 100 Hz above the normal 60 cycle frequency up to 10 MHz. Smart meters dramatically increase the many wave lengths and further overload the neutral wire. Because the neutral wire is undersized, the only place to send the overcurrent is into the ground. The current then goes through the ground back to the source. The result is that all the home wiring becomes a very large antenna to project all these oscillations. That means that land everywhere is electrified, an unhealthy situation for all life.

In the United States we have an infrastructure problem that must be corrected to protect our health. We need to quit producing unnatural frequencies and currents, and we need to increase the capacity of the neutral wire. We must quit using the earth as a return path to the source. In Europe neutral wires returning to the source are double the size of the outgoing wires, but not here. In the United States the ground is electrified pretty much everywhere, according to Sam Milham, author of Dirty Electricity. The most simple fix for this misconfiguration is to run an additional, large neutral wire back to the source.

Washington law adopts in full all portions of the NEC and the NESC. See WAC 296-46B-010 and WAC 296-45-045. This means that so-called smart meters are illegal. In violation of Washington law, they fail to provide a clear path to ground at all times. They fail to provide an adequate circuit breaker before them. They create large amounts of stray current or dirty electricity that flows through the building and back through the neutral wire to the nearest telephone pole, where the dirty electricity passes into the ground.

 

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The fact that the Department of Energy is encouraging and even subsidizing the installation of so-called advanced meters does not make them legal. Our agencies cannot be trusted because pro-industry hirelings have infiltrated them. Our agencies ignore the laws which they find inconvenient and which will reduce corporate profits.

 

Most of us are too trusting. We are trusting to the point of being naive. We cannot imagine that there are no limits to the greed of corporations which have no codes of ethics. Corporations with no codes of ethics are evil versions of artificial intelligence. They will do anything to protect and increase profits, even if they will be sickening their own children. Actually, corporations do not have children. They do not care about the children of the humans who are complicit with their malignant form of artificial intelligence. Capitalism’s main flaw is its inability to reign in its own excesses. It is blinded by greed.

 

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Insurance companies will pay for damage to appliances, equipment, and building structure resulting from surges, but only if the customer asks for and pays extra for a special endorsement.

 

Insurance companies will not pay for any harms, to persons or to property, suffered as a result of electromagnetic radiation. Neither homeowners nor businesses and probably not even the vendors of so-called advanced meters can get such coverage.

 

Insurance policies exclude coverage of harms caused by electromagnetic radiation, and this includes conventional cell phone bands as well as higher wavelength bands to be used by 5G.

 

Multiple underwriters, including Lloyd’s of London, refuse to cover injury or damage from electromagnetic radiation (EMF). Lloyd’s of London writes: “The Electromagnetic Fields Exclusion …              is applied across the market as standard.” The exclusion includes: “Bodily injury, property damage, or personal and advertising injury…provided that such injury or damage results from or is contributed to by the pathological properties of electromagnetic radiation.” CFC Underwriting, UK agent for Lloyd’s of London.

 

Some vilify insurance companies. I don’t. Insurance companies are 100 percent capitalized, meaning that they hold investments readily convertible to cash sufficient to cover the total of all liabilities guaranteed against. Further, they do their scientific and legal research. They refuse to cover harms resulting from excessive risks and from activities which violate laws and regulatory standards.

 

For example, insurance companies do not insure nuclear power plants or flood damage. Those markets are too risky and are left to the federal government. They do not cover earthquake damage unless there is a special rider which is costly and has high deductibles.

 

This means that we should pay attention when insurance companies will not insure something.

 

This means that when people get into their 50s and 60s, when most cancers appear, and start coming down with brain and heart cancer, neither Seattle nor the vendors of the smart equipment will have insurance coverage. The coverage is just not available.

 

Because of the insurance implications relating to so-called advanced meters, I will be sending a copy of this letter to the Insurance Commissioner, Michael Kreidler.

 

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In addition to emitting microwave radiation in the 900 megahertz to 2.4 GHz range, electronic meters emit dirty electricity at around 20,000 cycles per second. This is because electronic meters include a switched mode power supply to regulate voltage. The SMPS turns power on and off 20,000 times per second to cut off voltage peaks and prevent heat buildup.

 

Analog meters do not build up heat, and so analog meters need no SMPS.

 

The SMPS produces dirty electricity, also known as DE for short, technically known as “High Frequency Voltage Transients”, also known as HFVT or “Conducted Emissions” or CE. Dirty electricity is the rapid, erratic and violent change in voltage that happens thousands of times per second instead of the normal 60 cycles per second electricity we are used to here in the USA.

 

Stray current is harmful to our health and damages appliances and equipment, burning them out prematurely. Wikipedia says:

 

Disadvantages [of SMPS] include greater complexity, the generation of high-amplitude, high-frequency energy that the low-pass filter must block to avoid electromagnetic interference (EMI), a ripple voltage at the switching frequency and the harmonic frequencies thereof.

Very low cost SMPSs may couple electrical switching noise back onto the mains power line, causing interference with A/V equipment connected to the same phase. Non-power-factor-corrected SMPSs also cause harmonic distortion.

 

The dirty electricity pulsed out by electronic meters exceeds FCC Class B specifications and is not compatible with consumers’ existing electrical systems and appliances. This leads to early failure of appliances. Expect insurance companies to add exclusions to coverage against surges.  

 

These electrical transients propagate through the electrical system of a building, turning it into an antenna which broadcasts unwanted electromagnetic radiation and dirty electricity upon occupants. Stray current also propagates through foundation and ground to other buildings.

 

Physician Sam Milham, proves convincingly in his book Dirty Electricity, that lower frequency transients, down in the range of around 20,000 cycles per second cause cancer.

 

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Advocates of so-called advanced meters claim that they will enable consumers to monitor their usage in real time. However, the detailed minute by minute usage information obtained by said advanced meters is useless to customers who want to keep their bills down by avoiding electrical usage during peak times because such information is available only on a next day basis. Therefore, one of the major justifications given for so-called advanced meters – giving customers real time monitoring – is bogus.

 

On the other hand, there is real time monitoring software available on the open market, which does have the power to do usage monitoring in real time. Such software starts at $129. Search Amazon for the “Eyedro Home Electricity Monitor”. It plugs easily into the breaker panel.

 

The usage monitoring made available by said advanced meters will not result any savings to consumers. To the contrary, it will increase electric bills significantly because so-called advanced meters are running and consuming electricity constantly.

 

Advocates of so-called advanced meters claim that smart meters will improve the smart grid. This is not true. The detailed minute by minute usage information obtained by said advanced meters is useless to system managers in their task of balancing overall system loads. Such information is not available in real time, but only in summary form the following day. Further, measurements made at the substations are more than adequate for that purpose. The system does not need to know ups and downs in each household. Therefore, another of the major justifications given for so-called advanced meters – better regulation of the smart grid – is also bogus.

 

So-called advanced meters are receiving, broadcasting, and passing along radio and microwave reports every few seconds, up to 190,000 times per day, and in doing so will be consuming a considerable amount of electricity. For that reason, independent of other factors, they will consume more electricity than analog meters – which use only a minute amount of current to turn their fireproof aluminum wheels and report accurately on total watt hours used.

 

Reports from other service areas suggest that such receiving, broadcasting, and relaying consumes enough electricity to add around $10 per month to electric bills. Therefore, for this reason, independent of other factors, said advanced meters will consume more electricity and cost customers more money than analog meters.

 

In addition, so-called advanced meters do not measure usage as accurately as analog meters. Utility companies bill customers for the kilowatt hours of electricity consumed, but the GE digital meters do not measure kilowatt hours. They sample voltage and amperage peaks and use an unknown algorithm to make an estimated conversion of the peaks into watt hours. These calculations can be wrong, especially when the customer has various machines that turn on and off frequently and make brief but large voltage draws. This can result in artificially high watt hour reports and higher billings. Electronic meters perform differently in hotter, colder, dryer, and wetter conditions. On the other hand, analog meters measure watt hour consumption very accurately, regardless of high current draws or changing weather conditions.

 

Because the placement of said advanced meters will increase the amount of electricity consumed, they violate the letter and the spirt of the Kyoto and Paris climate protocols. They are the anthesis of green.

 

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Utility companies want to save money by reducing the number of meter readers. Any such savings is more than offset by other factors: that so-called advanced meters cost more, that they break down after only seven years, that they subject utility companies to liability, and that they will raise insurance rates or that insurance companies will exclude coverage, both for consumers and for utility companies.

 

The millions of dollars being spent to install smart meters and mesh networks should instead be used to equip every home with fiber optic or other fast internet connections. Through these fast connections, customers could monitor their own usage and report it to their utility companies on an automated basis through free software from the utility company. They could also use the software to monitor their usage on a real time basis.

 

Only if customers fail to report their own usage should the utility company charge the customer for a meter reading. And if customers are charged meter reading fees, those fees should be equal to the actual cost of reading meters. The monthly $15.37 opt-out meter reading fee that Seattle is charging exceeds the real cost of having a person read a meter.

 

As mentioned elsewhere, cell phones, tablets, and other wireless devices should all be capable of being plugged into hard wired connections at home, school, and work, so that cell phone talk, texting, Internet browsing, back up, and software updating can all be done through wired connections. We should be able to plug in on a hard-wired basis and turn off our Wi-Fis at home, school, and work.

 

Schools especially should be connected on a hard-wired basis, not by way of Wi-Fis in every classroom. I pity the child who sits right by the Wi-Fi day after day. Wi-Fis in schools should turned off. The cost of running category six cable to each desk is small relative to the health of our children.

 

Likewise, connections in homes and workplaces should be wired whenever possible. Wi-Fis should be turned off at night or when they are not being used.

 

Necessary hand-held gadgets should connect to Wi-Fis designed to operate at safer frequencies and lower energy levels.

 

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The Coalition Against Smart Meters and 5G is generally opposed to connecting nearly everything to the Internet, which seems to be goal of proponents of the Internet of Things. Most things should not be connected. I am willing to wait until I get home to turn on my oven manually. I do not want my refrigerator to order food for me. I am willing to walk around my home to turn my lights on and off. The exercise is good for me.

 

Equipment and appliances in our homes should not be connected to the internet. By definition, items connected to the Internet can be hacked. They will always be potential security holes. Will smart appliances all obtain SSL certificates? Will there be someone to upgrade software on connected appliances whenever a new virus comes out? No one will be compensated to keep up with security, and so electronic meters will be a gateway to a general loss of privacy.

 

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In summary, so-called advanced meters will cost consumers more than they are paying currently. They will raise expenses for utility companies and decrease profits or surpluses. Such meters will raise insurance rates for both utility companies and for customers or will result in termination of coverage for surges and electromagnetic radiation. Such meters will expose consumers to more intense and more concentrated radiation than analog meters, which produce no radiation. They are more wasteful of electricity than analog meters. They are more intrusive of privacy than analog meters. They are more hackable than analog meters. They will make some people sick in the short term, and they will affect the health of all of us in the long term.

 

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The wireless industry is proceeding with implementation of 5G technology. We will be going from 900 megahertz (MHz), which is .9 GHz, which is the low end of the cell phone band, to up to 5 and 6 GHz for Wi-Fis, 27 GHz, 42 GHz, and 90 GHz. The frequencies, wavelengths, and energy levels are as follows. For sake of comparison, I have included the frequency and wavelength of KVI radio broadcasting at 570 kilohertz.

 

Frequency  wavelength  energy level

 

570 kilohertz 525 meters  2.4 x 10-9 electron volts

 

900 megahertz  .33 meters   3.7 x 10-6 electron volts

 

1.9 MHz   .16 meters  7.8 x 10-6 electron volts

 

2.4 GHz   .13 meters  9.9 x 10-6 electron volts

 

6 GHz  49 millimeters 2.4 x 10-5 electron volts

 

27 GHz  11 millimeters 1.1 x 10-4 electron volts

 

90 GHz  3 millimeters 3.7 x 10-4 electron volts

 

As frequency rises, wavelength shorten, and energy levels rise. See calculators here and here. With higher frequencies, there are more photos arriving, and the energy level of each photon is greater.

 

AM radio (540 KHz to 1,600 KHz) and FM radio (88 MHz to 108 MHz) are carrier waves, not pulsed waves, and carrier waves do little harm. It is the pulsed waves in the cell phone and 5G bands that do harm.

 

All the negative things you can say about 4G operating up to 2.4 MHz is even more true of 5G at higher frequencies and even shorter wavelengths. For an excellent summary of the many reasons why 5G increases harm and provides no benefits, follow this link.

 

The 5G plan is speeding ahead as if it will do no harm to anyone. Cell phone companies plan to erect small cell broadcasters – the size of refrigerators – on telephones and light poles throughout our cities.

 

The plan is to use 5G millimeter microwaves to replace wired telephone lines completely. Ironically, for advanced meters to work, there must be fiber connections to the small cell broadcasting equipment. So why not just extend fiber a few more feet to each home or business?

 

Current 4G technology at frequencies of 900 megahertz to 1.9 gigahertz to 2.4 gigahertz is not fast enough for television, gaming, or the delivery of large amounts of data. The wireless industry seems to believe that there is a strong need for people to be able to watch TV as they walk around.

 

The wireless industry is developing 5G technology at 6 gigahertz up to 26 GHz and even up to 42 GHz and even 90 GHz. If 4G is hazardous to health, 5G will be even worse. The US Army has developed active denial systems which use microwaves at 95 GHz. They heat the skin so that opponents flee. Credible sources say that 6 GHz does the same thing although it takes longer.

 

The FCC has approved 5G. Read a summary of the 5G plan. It is being deployed now in Atlanta, Dallas, and Waco and is expected to be completed by the end of 2018.  

 

The California legislature, controlled overwhelmingly by Democrats, was manipulated into voting for a bill which would have deprived cities and counties from regulating and banning 5G installations. Fortunately, Governor Jerry Brown vetoed the bill.

 

FCC approval does not yet preempt the province of states, counties, and cities from regulating and banning 5G installations. Seattle should ban deployment of 5G.

 

Attorney Harry Lehmann warns that if a city allows the erection of so-called small cell 5G antennas on city utility poles, the city becomes liable. In part this is because there will be no insurance coverage for harm caused by microwave radiation. “He documents in detail the science indicating serious harm – including DNA impacts and cancer – from microwave radiation.”

 

The wireless industry admits that around 75% of 5G small cell bandwidth will be used to facilitate watching of video on portal devices. But do people really need to be able to watch movies and do gaming on portable devices as they walk around? Can’t they can go home or school or work and plug into an ethernet cable? Many can do this, and all should be able to.

 

As pointed out elsewhere a better goal for the wireless industry to pursue would be for them to become wired, for them to develop an easy to use interface which would allow users to go home or to an Internet café and plug their cell phones into ethernet connections. It should be easy for cell companies to create an adapter or connector which would make this possible, but none has been creative enough to do so. The latest iPhone comes with no plugin connection at all. It does absolutely everything wirelessly. Apple has really gone the wrong way down a dead-end street.

 

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Seattle acknowledges that utility easements are required in the Seattle Right of Way Improvements Manual at 4.15.1, which states:

 

Utility Easements

 

Need for utility easements: When public utilities for sewer, storm, or power facilities are constructed on private property, a utility easement will need to be granted to the City. These easements are needed to establish rights for the City including, but not limited to, construction, operation, and maintenance access as needed to own and operate the facility. http://www.seattle.gov/rowmanual/manual/4_15.asp

 

According to the Washington courts, the scope of an easement is not unlimited. If a property owner gives an easement for one purpose, the beneficiary of the easement cannot use the easement for another purpose. The easement is limited to the uses “originally contemplated”. The general rule regarding limitations on the extent of easements is:

 

We believe the servient owner is entitled to impose reasonable restraints on the right-of-way to avoid a greater burden on the servient owner’s estate than that originally contemplated in the easement grant, so long as such restraints do not unreasonably interfere with the dominant owner’s use”…. Rupert v. Gunter, 31 Wn. App. 27, (1982)”.

 

A servient owner is entitled to impose reasonable restraints on a right of way to avoid a greater burden on the servient owner’s estate than that originally contemplated in the easement grant, so long as such restraints do not unreasonably interfere with the dominant owner’s use. (Green v. Lupo, 32 Wn. App. 318, (1982).

 

Utility easements are easements just like road easements. Utility easements are subject to the same legal analysis as other easements. Easements have an intended scope, and so-called advanced meters exceed that intended scope. What then was the intended scope of the electric meter easements we or our predecessors gave in the past?

 

Analog meters are called “meters”. So-called advanced meters and electronic meters generally are also called “meters”. But the use of the same name is not proof that the term as used in utility easements granted in the past is the equivalent of the term as used when applied to so-called advanced meters.

 

Our utility easements authorized a grounded, surge protected, and fireproof meter that did not eavesdrop on us every minute of every day. Nor did the utility easement given in the past contemplate a downgrading of meters from rock solid and reliable to defective and insecure. Thus, so called advanced meters and electronic meters exceed the scope of the easements granted.

 

While the non-communicating advanced meters that Seattle is deploying now do not collect and broadcast our personal information, they too are not grounded, are not surge protected, and are not fireproof. As a bonus they come equipped with the same exterior terminal port as the communicating meters, into which someone with the right size optical probe can gain access unencrypted.

 

While the electronic GE and Itron non-communicating digital meters do not collect and broadcast our personal information and do not come with an exterior terminal port, they too are not grounded, are not surge protected, and are not fireproof.

 

All of these categories of electronic meters, due to their overall defectiveness, exceed the scope of utility easements granted.

 

In addition to being meters, these so-called advanced meters are wireless capable transmitters. They receive and pass along digital information from meter to meter to meter. None of this was contemplated when meter easements were entered into in the past.

 

Our utility easements did not authorize the collection of a minute by minute record of our every electrical behavior, nor the erecting of a Wi-Fi broadcasting and relay device on our homes, businesses, and schools, nor the creation of security holes into our homes, schools, and businesses.

 

There are marketing companies that are currently buying advanced meter information. Although Seattle has issued assurances that it will not sell personal and private data, there is nothing in Seattle regulations that would prohibit Seattle City Light or Landis+Gyr from doing so.

 

The electric meter easements, whether given recently or many years ago, did not make any reference to a utility company collecting customers’ private information and then having the right to sell it for a profit and doing so without obtaining the consent of customers and without compensating customers for the sale of their information.

 

Previous easements given did not authorize a meter which could reach into our homes and turn on or off any or all electrical devices nor take over our cameras and watch us. Advanced meters are designed to be able to do this. The original easements did not contemplate this level of intrusion and control.

 

The utility easement did not contemplate the removal of completely confidential, non-hackable meters and their replacement with advanced meter surveillance devices, and so for that reason they exceed the scope of the easements granted.

 

Utility companies therefore have no easements which authorizes the installation of said advanced meters, and therefore utility companies should be asking customers to OPT INTO receiving advanced meters and electronic meters instead of requiring those who do not want said meters to OPT OUT.

 

Therefore, if a utility company erects so-called advanced meters without getting a new and broader easement, it is committing trespass.

 

∞∞∞∞∞

 

The 4th Amendment to the United States Constitution says

 

 “The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated …”,

 

Article 1, Section 7 of the Washington States Constitution says:

 

“No person shall be disturbed in his private affairs, or his home invaded, without authority of law”.

 

The 4th Amendment and the 14th Amendment are limitations on the power of federal and state governments. They do not limit the behavior of non-governmental persons unless they are acting as agents for government.

 

Article 1 Section 7 of the Washington Constitution may be broader in scope than the federal 4th and 14th Amendments because it is worded in the passive voice. It says, “no person shall be disturbed …”, which may mean that there is constitutional prohibition of both government and non-governmental utility companies from intruding into our privacy.

 

The routine collection of personal and private information with the potential to sell that information to third parties and to do this without the consent of customers and compensation to customers, the power to reach into homes and gather private information and even to turn off individual electrical appliances, and the setting up and maintain of equipment that could allow hackers to observe us electronically, visually, and aurally is a violation of customers’ privacy rights under the US and Washington Constitutions.

 

Making it easy for us to be hacked is another way smart meters violate our rights to privacy. So-called advanced meters have an exterior terminal port, as discussed elsewhere. Utility workers and anyone with the right size optical probe can plug into this port and have complete access to the said meter, the home or business, and to the entire AMI network. This is an unacceptable hole in our privacy and grid security.

 

∞∞∞∞

 

There should be no extra fees charged to those who decide to opt out or who decline to opt in, neither initial one-time fees nor continuing fees. The initial opt-out fee should be zero because it costs nothing just to leave an analog meter in place. In initial opt-out fee is not a fee; it is a coercive penalty. Washington law requires that utility fees be reasonable. See RCW 80.28.010, which says:.

 

All charges made … gas, electricity or water, or for any service rendered or to be rendered in connection therewith, shall be just, fair, reasonable and sufficient. … Every gas company, electrical company, wastewater company, and water company shall furnish and supply such service, instrumentalities and facilities as shall be safe, adequate and efficient, and in all respects just and reasonable.

 

 

 

There should be no continuing monthly opt out fee, but if there is to be one, it should cost no more than the actual cost to send out a meter reader. If consumers install utility measuring software on their computers and report their own meter readings electronically, they should not be charged any monthly fee.

 

Consumers who refuse to accept an advanced meter should not be required to accept a non-communicating advanced meter or a GE digital non-communicating meter. They should be allowed to retain their analog meter or in its place accept a new or refurbished analog meter.

 

It is believed that non-communicating advanced meters are exactly the same meters as the communicating meters, with the sole difference that the communicating function is turned off. It is believed that the communicating function can easily be turned on remotely from Seattle City Light headquarters of by Landis+Gyr, agent for Seattle City Light. If this is true, a customer will have no way of knowing whether surveillance has been activated. Seattle has no contractual duty to notify customers that surveillance has been activated, that his or her personal and private information is being collected, or that it is being sold.

 

∞∞∞∞

 

To summarize, let’s compare our trusted analog meters. They can be bought for $25 to $50. They last for 40 years. They provide a path for overcurrent to go to ground. They contain spark-gap surge protection. They do not catch fire. They consume only a minute amount of electricity to turn the wheels as they very accurately measure watt hours used. They cost less than electronic meters and last longer. They contain no switch mode power supply (SMPS) and therefore emit no dirty electricity. They meet all regulatory standards.

 

Conversely, electronic meters lack a path to ground. They cost $200 or more. They only last five to seven years. They contain inferior surge protection in the form of a varistor, which is protective only up to 300 volts. They catch fire. Due to their switched mode power supply (SMPS) they emit dirty electricity and turn the entire home electrical system into an antenna, further exposing occupants to harmful electromagnetic radiation. They consume a lot of electricity to operate. They are always on, always busy. They do not measure watt hours used but estimate watt hours based on an average of voltage and amperage peaks. They increase electric utility bills. They use more total electricity. They increase expenses for utility companies and lower profits and surpluses. They fail to comply with laws and regulations and are therefore illegal.

 

Newer is not always better. Computerized is not always better. This is especially true in the case of electronic meters.

 

∞∞∞∞

 

Those who own homes may opt out if they pay the initial opt out fee and pay a continuing monthly opt out fee. Tenants who rent single family homes, duplexes, triplexes, and four-plexes may opt out if they or their landlord pay the opt out fees and if their landlord applies on their behalf. However, those living in five unit buildings and above may not opt out under any circumstances.

 

There are more reasons and not fewer reasons why occupants of larger buildings should be allowed to opt out: In larger buildings more people are closer to more advanced meters. In larger buildings it is more likely and not less likely that there will be hard wired connections throughout the building, so that any monitoring of usage (total monthly usage only) could be done via a hard-wired connection. Further, those who live in larger apartment buildings generally have lower incomes and more of them are people of color, and so this opt-out policy discriminates against these disadvantaged classes.

 

Schools, businesses, and hospitals are not allowed to opt out.

 

Those who have solar roofs are “net metered”. They have two meters, one to measure how much electricity the solar roof produces and another to measure total consumption. They must accept two advanced communicating meters and may not opt out. This policy will discourage owners from installing solar roofs and encourage those who already have them to stop using them.

 

The owners of any buildings other than one to four family residences may not opt out. Those who own commercial buildings, rental property with more than four units, schools, and churches may not opt out. These prohibitions against opting out are irrational and discriminatory. They have no basis in terms of public need. They are therefore unconstitutional.

 

∞∞∞∞

 

Those who own rental property have good reason to be concerned.

 

A ten-unit apartment building will have eleven advanced meters, one for each unit and one for electricity consumed in common areas. Frequently meters are housed inside apartment buildings, increasing the likelihood that a smart meter explosion could turn into a blaze that will consume the entire building.

 

All the tenants will be bathed in constant spikes of electromagnetic radiation, every few seconds, 24 hours per day. Units above or adjacent to or on the other side of a wall from the smart meters will be irradiated most intensely.

 

Owners of rental property have financial concerns. Owners will be concerned that if so-called advanced meters are installed in their buildings that their tenants will – if they can – move to other apartment buildings where they will not be irradiated.

 

Owners will be concerned that potential tenants will be less likely to move into their building if they know that they will be irradiated by advanced meters or that rents will have to be lowered on units adjacent to advanced meters.

 

Owners will be concerned that they might have to disclose to potential tenants that they will be irradiated by said advanced meters.

 

Real estate brokers and real estate multiple association will have to decide whether to require sellers to disclosure to potential buyers and potential tenants that they will be irradiated by said advanced meters and that the potential harm is greater to tenants who are closest to the meters.

 

Owners will be concerned that it may be especially hard for them to rent units that are adjacent to advanced meters or that he may have to reduce the rent for those two units in order to rent them.

 

Given that advanced meters consume more electricity, owners will be concerned over higher electric bills. They will also be concerned that their insurance premiums will go up.

 

∞∞∞∞

 

Therefore, on behalf of Coalition Against Smart Meters and 5G, I hereby demand that Seattle City Light terminate the installation of so-called advanced meters and replace those installed with analog meters.

 

And on behalf of the Coalition I demand that Seattle put an end to efforts by wireless industries to implement 5G technology.

 

∞∞∞∞

 

There is one final and important issue which we should not ignore. It is the inability of our leaders to recognize such scams as smart meters and 5G. Our leaders appear unable inability to detect when they are being fed lies. They excel in their ability to get elected but fail in their support for profitable frauds.

 

Smart meter fraud is not the only fraud which our leaders buy into. There are many others, and our leaders fall for many of them. This is a systemic problem and a serious flaw in our democracy.

 

Somehow, despite the complete inferiority of so-called advanced meters, a previous Seattle City Council and a previous mayor were duped into voting – all ten of them, unanimously – to implement the advanced meter and mesh network initiative now assaulting us.

 

It is amazing how impervious to reason regarding this issue were the previous Council, the previous mayor, and the previous leadership at Seattle City Light. They all went along with the advanced meter scam despite the enormous price tag. They went along despite the reams of scientific journal articles submitted by members of Safe Utility Meters Alliance Northwest, also known as SUMA-NW, and despite the hours of testimony which SUMA-NW presented.

 

Even socialist Council member Kshama Sawant, who one would think would have been the most concerned about the health and welfare of ordinary people, was duped. She led the Council committee which pushed through the smart meter program.

 

Why were the previous Council and the previous mayor such suckers? Did they not study physics or math in high school? Or did they not understand science well enough and so were subject to intimidation? Most likely they just went along with what the Department of Energy and Seattle City Light administrators advised. They were a rubber stamp.

 

Did Seattle City Light administrators come from the wireless industry through the revolving door? Will they return later to the wireless industry and receive big bonuses? These are questions which must be asked and answered.

 

Were the previous Council and the previous mayor accepting campaign donations directly or indirectly from wireless industries? According to Upton Sinclair, “It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it.” Likewise, it may be hard to get a politician to understand something if his campaign donations depend on him not understanding it.

 

There is a science of manipulation, to which the previous Council and mayor were apparently subjected. These techniques were perfected by Edward Bernays, double nephew of Sigmund Freud, considered the father of public relations. Bernays believed that the upper classes should manipulate ordinary people using his public relations techniques because ordinary people are fools. He wrote books entitled Propaganda, The Engineering of Consent, and Public Relations.

 

This black art includes techniques of advertising, marketing, suggestion, and even mass hypnosis. Through the power of suggestion, especially when it comes from respected figures, particularly those in white coats, people can be manipulated into believing and doing the strangest things.

 

The techniques include the following: making big contributions to colleges and charities and leveraging this to recruit believable presenters such as doctors, dentists, and scientists; providing arguments which appear on the surface to prove the case; building a maze of false claims in which politicians and the public get trapped; providing pat answers which appear on the surface to respond to arguments from opponents and which thus block avenues of escape from the maze; creating prejudice against those who disagree; suggesting that opponents are conspiracy theorists, malingerers, and wearers of tin foil hats.

 

Politicians should learn to resist such manipulation. They should wake up and recognize that fraudsters and dupes will come trying to sell them profitable frauds. Politicians are experts at getting 50.1% of the vote, but they may not be experts in matters involving science. They may not have done well in physics and chemistry in high school. So, when some scientific claim is made, they may be easy to intimidate and thus manipulate. They may just be going along with the leaders of their agencies.

 

There are other examples of profitable frauds that our leaders go along with. Nuclear power is a profitable fraud. Nuclear power plants have no off switch. They will have to be monitored at great expense for 500,000 years or more.

 

Roundup is another profitable fraud. The World Health Organization says it is a Type 2A probable carcinogen. A Type 2A carcinogen is one which is proven to be carcinogenic in animals and therefore is considered a probable carcinogenic in humans. The state of California has declared it a confirmed human carcinogen. Roundup – which includes glyphosate and many other toxic adjuvants – kills certain bacteria in the stomachs of humans and salmon that are necessary for digestion. This gives us sick stomachs and kills salmon. Roundup is used to kill weeds. There is now a growing robotic weed remover technology. Roundup is no longer necessary.

 

When the World Health Organization ruled in 2014 that Roundup was a carcinogen, did Monsanto immediately pull Roundup from the market? No. Did our president use his emergency powers pertaining to military security to ban it, as other countries have done, even Russia? No. Did our governor ban Roundup? No. Have our agencies held hearings and proposed regulations to ban Roundup? No. Did Seattle stop spraying salmon killing Roundup on streets, parks, and golf courses? No. It seems that eliminating dandelions is more important than preserving salmon.

 

You must ask why. You must insist on an answer. We rose up against efforts by Washington legislature to exempt the Legislature in certain ways from public disclosure requirements. This too is a wrong we should rise up against.

 

Another profitable fraud is the contamination of our mountain pure drinking water with toxic waste grade so-called fluoride. Another is the use of fluoride in dental offices and the use of fluoride toothpaste. Many dentists have been duped into supporting this poisonous practice, and in turn, the sucker dentists manipulate politicians and the public.

 

The so-called fluoride used is a soup of dozens of heavy metals, including lead, arsenic, cadmium, mercury, and thallium, The fluoride used adds roughly 4.0 trillion atoms of lead to each liter of drinking water. The fluoride used leaches lead from the many pipes and faucets which contain lead, producing lead levels in some Seattle schools water fountains of up to 1,600 parts per billion, which when multiplied by Avogadro’s number adds up to around 5,000 trillion atoms of lead in each liter of water. Fluoride is another salmon killer, just like Roundup.

 

Tetraethyl lead ranks among the worst profitable frauds. The lengthy continuation of a practice does not prove its legality. For example, the tetraethyl lead fraud and mass poisoning lasted from the mid-1920s to the mid-1980s, and still continues in Afghanistan, Burma, and other countries. It continues right here in the United States in that most piston driven aircraft still burn leaded aviation gas, spewing lead everywhere they fly and raising blood lead levels in areas around airports. When our agencies go after lead, they focus on lead paint and ignore lead leached by fluoride and lead spewed out by piston airplanes.

 

Drilling for petroleum and gas is another profitable scam. All new energy capital investment should go into building renewable energy technology. It is a scam by the oil and gas industry that we continue to drill. In one of my songs I say:

 

Hey Shell Oil, how much did you spend?  

Eight billion dollars in the Chukchi Sea?  

You left. You said there was no oil, but really there’s a lot. 

It was Mother Nature’s storms that drove you off. 

 

Eight billion dollars  

Would build enough solar  

Enough solar power to permanently power

two hundred thirty thousand homes.  

 

Hey Exxon Mobile, look up not down  

To solar and wind and wave.  

Stop drilling NOW. The future is green.  

Be a big, green energy company.

 

∞∞∞∞

 

Stephen Hawking warned us of the coming artificial intelligence. He was wrong. Artificial intelligence is already here. Once a cash flow gets going, it is hard to stop. Once incorporated it has a life of its own. A corporation like Monsanto, lacking a strong code of ethics, operates as a form of artificial intelligence. It is a dangerous entity, one with limited liability, and hosts of attorneys, accountants, and public relations manipulators to service this artificial “person”. Yes, corporations have some degree of personhood under the law, a position which should be retracted, although not all the way. State governments have to cancel corporate charters within their boundaries, meaning that investors could be on the hook for Monsanto’s Roundup poison conspiracy. Corporations should do some public good. In the same song I say:

 

Profits must be  

Goal number two.  

After doing something   

Good for the world. 

 

There are profitable frauds, and we and our politicians should oppose them. Monsanto will back down, because it knows it can figure out another way to make money. But Monsanto will not stop unless we stop Monsanto in the courts. The legislature and congress seem unable to act.

 

We must take the money out of politics and outlaw the revolving door, as I have proposed. This is a plan that would work. Read it. If we fail to do that, we will be facing one profitable fraud after another until we and many other species are sick or dead.

 

Politicians must wake up. We must wake them up and keep them awake.

 

∞∞∞∞

 

The Coalition assists other groups opposed to smart meters and 5G and urges them to forward this link to as many people as possible.

 

The Coalition requests that other groups rewrite and re-address this letter and the attached Request for Disclosure of Public Records, and direct them to other utility companies. Get busy.

 

∞∞∞∞

 

I am also submitting Requests for Disclosure of Public Records addressed to the City of Seattle and to Seattle City Light.

 

If they do not already have research reports or other information responsive to my Requests, this is evidence that they have failed up to the present to do their due diligence.

 

If they fail to develop research reports on all of the issues raised by my Requests, this will be evidence of their continuing recklessness.

 

Sincerely,

 

 

 

James Robert Deal, as Attorney for

Coalition Against Smart Meters and 5G

WSBA Number 8103

 

REQUEST FOR DISCLOSURE OF PUBLIC RECORDS

 

May 4, 2018

 

Read online at:
www.JamesRobertDeal.org/demand-that-seattle-ban-smart-meters-and-5G

 

Seattle City Light

Jim Baggs, Acting General Manager and CEO

P.O. Box 34023
Seattle WA 98124-4023

Submitted through Seattle Public Records Request Center at

www.seattle.gov/public-records/public-records-request-center

Also sent by email to: SCL_CityLight_PDR@seattle.gov

 

Seattle City Council

P.O. Box 94749
Seattle WA 98124-4749

Submitted through Seattle Public Records Request Center at

www.seattle.gov/public-records/public-records-request-center

 

Courtesy copies sent to:

 

Jenny Durkan, Seattle Mayor
P.O. Box 94749
Seattle WA 98124-4749
Also sent by email to: jenny.durkan@seattle.gov

 

Timothy Harris, Assistant Seattle City Attorney
701 Fifth Avenue, Suite 2050
Seattle WA 98104-7097
Also sent by email to: timothy.harris@seattle.gov.   

 

Governor Jay Inslee
PO Box 40002
Olympia, WA 98504-0002

 

Bob Ferguson, Washington Attorney General
1125 Washington Street SE
PO Box 40100
Olympia WA  98504-0100

 

Sid Logan, Kathy Vaughn, Toni Olson, Commissioners
Snohomish County PUD
PO Box 1107
Everett, WA 98206-1107

 

To the City of Seattle and Seattle City Light:

 

Regarding this request for public disclosure, when I ask for “items”, I am asking for any correspondence, letters, research, studies reports, writings, emails, recordings, memos, notes, or documents of any kind, whether in printed or electronic form, and whether in your possession or under your control.

 

When I refer to “you” I am referring to all executive and staff members of the city of Seattle and Seattle City Light.

 

Items are considered to be under your control if sub-contractors of the city of Seattle or Seattle City Light possess them – because they have the right to request and receive them.

 

The term “advanced meters” refers to and includes the new electronic meters that Seattle City Light and other utility companies, public and private, are currently installing. They are also referred to as AMI meters. They include data collection, surveillance functions and broadcasting and relay functions that report data to headquarters. There are also advanced meters in which the communicating functions have been disabled.

 

The term “electronic meters” is broader. It includes the advanced meters as defined above and also such non-communicating meters as the GE electronic meters. The term does not include analog electromechanical meters.

 

When I refer to “surveillance features” or “broadcasting features” and I am referring to the components of advanced meters that record personal and private information of electric customers regarding their electrical behavior and that transmits that data through a mesh network to neighboring advanced meters and eventually to headquarters.

 

When I refer to “analog meters” I am referring to the all metal, fireproof, grounded, and surge protected electro-mechanical meters that are currently in place on most Seattle homes and businesses.

  

∞∞∞∞

 

The Coalition also requests that any fees for providing the items requested be waived, given that obtaining responses to these requests is in the public interest. The requested items will be made available to the general public free of charge on one of my web sites and is not for commercial use.

 

In the event that you are unwilling to waive fees for providing the items requested, you should inform me of the total charges in advance of fulfilling our request. We would prefer that responses not be sent in paper format but instead that they be sent by e-mail attachment, by posting to a Dropbox account, or some similar account, or by mailing a CD-ROM.

 

We look forward to receiving your responses to these requests within five business days, as the statute requires.

 

If there are requests that will take more than five business days for you to respond to, then you should respond to those requests for which you have responses readily available, and regarding those requests that will require more than five days to respond to, please identify those requests and give an estimated time when you may be able to respond.

 

If any third party objects to the release of the documents requested, Seattle City Light should inform me so that we can agree on reasonable grounds for exclusion.

 

Therefore, please respond to the following requests for disclosure of public records:

 

1.       Send me any items that list and describe the types of advanced meters that Seattle City Light is installing, for ordinary residences, for medium usage customers, and for high usage customers.

 

2.       Send me any items which discuss the number of electric customers of Seattle City Light.

 

3.       Send any items which list the utility districts outside the Seattle city limits will receive so-called advanced meters from Seattle City Light.

 

4.       Send me any items that discuss the varistor in advanced meters and in electronic meters. Include any items which discuss the maximum voltage levels which they protect against.

 

5.       Send me any items that address the potential for said advanced meters and electronic meters to catch fire.

 

6.       Send me any items pertaining to the qualifications of the installers of said advanced meters and whether they are certified electricians.

7.       Send me any items that pertain to surge protection in advanced meters and in electronic meters other than advanced meters.

 

8.       Send me any items that pertain to grounding or the lack thereof in advanced meters and electronic meters other than advanced meters.

 

9.       Send me any items pertaining surge protection in analog meters.

 

10.     Send me any items pertaining to grounding in analog meters.

 

11.     Send any items that address the potential for said advanced meters to catch fire.

 

12.     Send any items that address the potential for electronic meters other than advanced meters to catch fire.

 

13.     Send any items that address the policy of Seattle City Light to remove or not to remove said advanced meters immediately after they have caught fire and to make them available or not make them available for inspection by insurance investigators and the fire department.

 

14.     Send me any items that address the differences between those advanced meters which communicate and those advanced meters which do not communicate.

 

15.     Send me any items that address whether advanced meters which communicate and those advanced meters which do not communicate are of the same design, with the communicating function either enabled or disabled.

 

16,     Send me any items that address whether the communication function on advanced meters can be turned on or off remotely by Seattle City Light or its agents

 

17.     Send me any items that address whether the communicating function in advanced meters may be turned on or off by physically toggling a certain switch on said meters.

 

18.     Send me any items which address whether the communication function may be turned on or off by replacing a communicating advanced meter with a non-communicating advanced meter.

 

19.     Send me any items that address how frequently advanced meters that have a communicating function collect information on electrical usage.

 

20.     Send me any items that address how frequently advanced meters that have a communicating function report electrical usage.

 

21.     Send me any items that discuss how customers will know if their advanced meter has been changed from non-communicating mode to communicating mode.

 

22.     Send me any items which discuss whether advanced meters with a communicating function contain a remote disconnect.

 

23.     Send me any items which discuss whether advanced meters which are non-communicating contain a remote disconnect.

 

24.     Whereas the 4^th Amendment to the United States Constitution says

 

“The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated …”,

 

And whereas Article 1, Section 7 of the Washington States Constitution says:

 

“No person shall be disturbed in his private affairs, or his home invaded, without authority of law”,

 

send me any items pertaining to whether the surveillance and broadcasting aspect of said advanced meters violate customers’ rights to privacy under the foregoing constitutional provisions.

 

25.     Send me any items that allow, authorize, or bar public or private utilities or their agents to sell information that they collect through the surveillance and broadcasting features of advanced meters.

 

26.     Send me any items pertaining to whether said advanced meters are subject to being hacked.

 

27.     Send any items pertaining to whether any increased potential for advanced meters to be hacked violates consumers’ rights to privacy.

 

28.     Send any items pertaining to whether exposing consumers to the increased likelihood of being hacked is negligence on the part of Seattle City Light.

 

29.     Send any items pertaining to the external socket on advanced meters, into which an optical probe can be inserted.

 

30.     Send me any items which address whether a person plugging into said external socket with an optical probe can access said meter, and/or the entire mesh network, and/or the entire electrical system.

 

31.     Send me any items that pertain to advanced meter opt out policies.

 

32.     Send me any items that pertain to how much is charged for initial opt-out fees for each class of customer.

 

33.     Send me any items that pertain to how much is charged for continuing monthly opt-out fees for each class of customer.

 

34.     Send me any items that address opt out policy regarding apartments with more than four units, schools, businesses, hospitals, and homes with net metered solar roofs.

 

35.     Send me any items that address why owners and/or residents in apartments with more than four units, schools, businesses, hospitals, and homes with net metered solar roofs are not allowed to opt out of receiving an advanced meter.

 

36.     Send me any items that address whether leaving present analog meters in place will incur any up-front cost.

 

37.     Send me any items that address how much up front cost is incurred when analog meters are left in place.

 

38.     Send any items that address whether a person who opts out of receiving a new communicating advanced meter is required to accept a new non-communicating advanced meter or will be allowed to keep his or her existing analog meter or receive a new or reconditioned analog meter.

 

39.     Send any items that address why a person who opts out of receiving a new communicating advanced meter is required to accept a new non-communicating advanced meter instead of being allowed to keep his or her existing analog meter or receive a new or reconditioned analog meter.

40.     Send me any items that discuss whether so-called advanced meters and electronic meters increase total electrical usage over analog meters.

 

41.     Send any items that discuss the number of meter readers currently employed by Seattle City Light.

 

42.     Send any items that discuss how much money Seattle City Light will save on its cost for meter readers by installing advanced meters.

 

43.     Send me any items that address how much electricity advanced meters that have the communicating function engaged consume as they operate.

 

44.     Send me any items that address how much electricity advanced meters that have the communicating function disengaged consume as they operate.

 

45.     Send me any items that address how much electricity analog electromechanical meters consume as they measure usage.

 

46.     Send me any items that pertain to the purchase cost to Seattle City Light of advanced meters currently being installed for all classes of electricity users.

 

47.     Send me any items that pertain to the cost of new and refurbished analog electro-mechanical meters.

 

48.     Send me any items that address the availability of new and refurbished analog meters.

 

49.     Send me any items that show the cost of the AMI mesh network including relays, computers, and the cost of installation.

 

50.     Send me any items that address the expected useful life of analog electro-mechanical meters.

 

51.     Send me any items that address the expected useful life of advanced meters.

 

52.     Send me any items that address whether the communicating function of said smart meters will increase electric bills and by how much.

 

53.     Send me any items that address whether the broadcasting and surveillance features of so-called advanced meters and the right of the public utility to collect and/or resell private data were “originally contemplated” when electric utility easements in Seattle were created.

 

54.     Send me any items that address whether the additional costs for electrical usage that said advanced meters will impose for their broadcasting and surveillance features were “originally contemplated” when electric utility easements were created.

 

55.     Send me any items that address whether meters which would have to be replaced every five to seven years instead of every 40 years were “originally contemplated” when electric utility easements were created.

 

56.     In light of the fact that part of utility companies’ justification for installing advanced meters is to reduce the number of meter readers and save money on their salaries, send me any items pertaining to why advanced meters report and relay information minute by minute and even every few seconds instead of once each billing cycle..          Send me any items that show whether analog meters meet the accuracy requirements of WAC 480-100-338. Please included actual test results.

 

58.     Send me any items that show whether so-called advanced meters meet the accuracy requirements of WAC 480-100-338. Please included actual test results.

 

59.     Send me any items that discuss whether analog meters comply with the National Electrical Code Article 240.4.

 

60.     Send me any items that discuss whether so-called advanced meters and electronic meters comply with the National Electrical Code Article 240.4.

 

61.     Send me any items that discuss whether so-called advanced meters comply with the National Electrical Safety Code section 92D.

 

62.     Send me any items that discuss whether electronic meters other than advanced meters comply with the National Electrical Safety Code section 92D.

 

63.     Send me any items that discuss whether analog meters comply with the National Electrical Safety Code section 92D.

 

64.     Send me any items that discuss whether analog meters comply with the National Electrical Safety Code section 215B.

 

65.     Send me any items that discuss whether advanced meters comply with the National Electrical Safety Code section 215B.

 

66.     Send me any items that discuss whether electronic meters other than advanced meters comply with the National Electrical Safety Code section 215B.

 

67.     Send me any items pertaining to electro-sensitivity to electromagnetic radiation

 

68.     Send me any items pertaining to the portion of the population that is electro-sensitive.

 

69.     Send me any items pertaining to the effects of said advanced meters on those who are electro-sensitive.

 

70.     Send me any items pertaining to adverse effects of so-called advanced meters on eyes in exacerbating cataracts.

 

71.     Send me any items pertaining to adverse effects of advanced meters on birds and insects.

 

72.     Send me any items pertaining to current, future, or possible implementation of 5G cellular technology and 5G broadcasting technology in Seattle.

 

Sincerely,

 

 

James Robert Deal, as Attorney for
Coalition Against Smart Meters and 5G
WSBA Number 8103