Letters to the Editor: 3-30-17

Don’t let smart meters come to Big Island

A number of announcements accompanying HELCO’s monthly bills have promised a new electrical grid for the Big Island in 2018 to be powered by wireless electric meters known as smart meters. So far, the Public Utilities Commission has failed to approve HECO’s application to install smart meters on Maui, Oahu and Hawaii Island. Considering the many problems presented by smart meters in other states, the PUC should deny any request by HECO to install smart meters for the following reasons:

1. Smart meters do not meet UL electrical safety standards set by Underwriters Laboratories.

2. Smart meters emit microwave energy which has been shown to cause house fires.

3. Smart meters operate through a computer network and can be easily hacked, violating personal privacy which can be sold to corporate interests or for government surveillance. A smart hacker from Russia or from down the street can get into smart meter data as well.

4. Smart meters cause inconsistent energy costs, often increasing monthly electrical bills due to insufficiency of the wireless “smart” grid to accurately reflect electrical usage. The old fashioned analog meter provided reliable monthly information on electricity costs. There is no need to fix something that isn’t broken.

5. Smart meters can have serious adverse health effects. In 2011, the California PUC discovered that smart meters could produce up to a dangerous 190,000 pulses of electromagnetic frequencies per day, every day. Unlike a cellphone, this type of radiation cannot be turned off. Children, pregnant women, seniors, those with immune deficiencies, persons with pacemakers and implants are especially at risk. According to the World Health Organization, radiation devices such as smart meters are a Class 2B possible cancer causing agent in the same category as lead, DDT and chloroform.

HECO has no business forcing smart meters down our throats.

Janet Ashkenazy

Honokaa