Which meter do you trust?

Posted on April 14, 2015 by Stop Smart Meters Australia

Back in the good old days, before smart meters, before the privatisation of the Victorian Electrical system, there was the state government owned State Electricity Commission of Victoria.  The SECV was disbanded in 1993 as various private electricity companies (largely foreign owned) scrambled for a piece of the lucrative action. See Vicpower website.

The SECV used to send its customers a periodic ‘Customer News’.  SEC customer news no. 13In the issue distributed around about 1993, the year of the SEC’s demise (and the issue’s number is ominously ‘No. 13’) the SECV was at pains to assure its customers that their (analogue) electricity meter is accurate and within the limits set down in the Australian Standards specifications.  Was this assurance prophetic, foreseeing the introduction of smart meters to Victoria under a privatised electricity network?

The rollout of smart meters in Victoria saw complaints to the Energy and Water Ombudsman of Victoria (EWOV) go through the roof.  The private electricity distributors in Victoria claim that the skyrocketing electricity consumption of many customers who‘ve just received a smart meter is due to the smart meters being accurate and analogue meters being inaccurate.  Not according to the SEC’s newsletter.  Which meter is accurate?

The SECV newsletter goes on to say that their meters “can be expected to stay inside the allowable range throughout its working life”.  Are smart meters accurate for even one day?  Customers in Victoria and around the world report their bills nearly doubling, and sometimes even more, from day one of having a smart meter installed.

The SECV in its 13th newsletter also tells customers that their analogue meter will last 30 years and more.  That’s fairly indisputable.  Some of those who were smart enough to retain their analogue meter have a meter that is possibly 70 years old.

Not so the ‘smart’ meter.  It has an optimistic lifespan of about 15 years.  “Given there is limited real experience to draw from, we considered it reasonable to assume that the meters will be replaced 15 full years after they were installed in the mass rollout”, quoted from ‘Advanced metering infrastructure cost benefit analysis’.  And it won’t be the foreign owned electricity distributors who will be footing the bill when the smart meter needs replacing.  It will be the customers.  No financial loss to the electricity distributor.

The SECV newsletter goes on to say that failures of analogue meters “over their operational life are quite rare”.  Not so with smart meters.  All it takes is a common occurrence like a vehicle hitting a power pole for hundreds of local smart meters to simultaneously explode.  See ‘Hundreds of smart meters simultaneously explode’  Ask those residents what they thought of the smart grid’s ability to quickly detect and rectify blackouts.

Which meter lasts longer, measures accurately to Australian standards and is less likely to fail?  You don’t have to be very smart to figure that one out.

Posted in billing blunders, Bills Soar, Blowing up, Cost Blowout, explosions, lifespan, Safety, Smart grid, standards | Tagged , | 34 Comments

AusNet to pay $125 each to 230,000 customers for smart meter IT system glitch | Herald Sun

Posted on April 8, 2015 by Stop Smart Meters Australia

A POWER giant has to pay $28.75 million compensation to hundreds of thousands of customers with smart meters that are not functioning ­properly due to an “unstable” IT system.

The 230,000 AusNet Services customers will each be paid $125 with the problem not ­likely to be fully resolved until the end of the year.

The distribution company, which covers Melbourne’s eastern suburbs and northeast and eastern Victoria, will this month contact those affected.

Customers should be paid the compensation rebates within the next three months.

Other distributors United Energy, CitiPower and Powercor will also pay the compensation for faulty meters but only about 2500 customers across those companies have been effected.

An unstable IT system has caused mass delays in activating AusNet smart meters to remotely transmit electricity use data. Those meters are instead still manually read.

Billing accuracy is unaffected, but customers are missing out on services such as remote reconnection when moving house. Some are also blocked from signing on to retailers’ flexible tariffs that charge consumers for electricity according to time of use.

AusNet Services has fitted more than 700,000 smart meters. Of those, 470,000 are communicating remotely but the rest are not.

The problem is not expected to be fully resolved until the end of next year.

Spokesman Jonathon Geddes said the business was “working hard to complete the program as quickly as possible”.

“Due to instability issues with our metering systems’ performance … AusNet Services reduced meter conversions for remote communication while working to ensure stability,” Mr Geddes said.

Consumers were entitled to compensation if their smart meters were not remotely read by March 31.

“The Victorian Government has required we pay eligible customers a one-off $125 rebate. These customers will continue to have their meters manually read and won’t have access to the benefits of a ­remote communicating meter, such as remote reconnection when moving house.”

The company identified smart meter IT problems, such as overnight electricity consumption data delivery, last year.

It is spending $175 million on a fix-it program.

Karen Collier  

Via: http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/victoria/ausnet-to-pay-125-each-to-230000-customers-for-smart-meter-it-system-glitch/story-fni0fit3-1227293346539

 

Posted in Smart Meter | 12 Comments

Public submissions from Tasmania’s draft energy strategy are now available online

Posted on April 6, 2015 by Stop Smart Meters Australia

Submissions from the public on Tasmania’s draft energy strategy paper titled ‘Restoring Tasmania’s Energy Advantage’ are available for viewing online and can be found at: Tasmania’s Energy Strategy Submissions

The majority of respondents raised concern regarding Tasmania’s vision, which includes ‘accommodating new technologies (such as smart meters), to ensure that the interests of Tasmanian customers are advanced.’

Stop Smart Meters Australia’s submission is listed as ‘SSMA’.

SSMA’s submission can also be found on our Submissions page, along with our other submissions.

Posted in Smart Meter | Tagged , | 8 Comments

Smart meter health surveys show striking symptom similarities

Posted on March 25, 2015 by Stop Smart Meters Australia

Two recent studies into the health impacts of wireless smart meters show striking similarities, despite having been conducted independently of each other and on separate sides of the world.  One survey was conducted in the USA and the other, a peer reviewed study in Victoria, Australia.

Both reports list insomnia as the most commonly occurring symptom and, of the top 10 symptoms, the same 8 symptoms appear in both reports.  These symptoms include headaches, tinnitus (ringing in the ears), cognitive disturbances (memory, concentration, confusion), fatigue/weakness, dizziness, cardiac anomalies and neuropathy.

Steve Weller, Vice President of SSMA Inc., in an email to ARPANSA says, “If EHS was purely psychological as some experts suggest, it would mean that approximately 37,000,000 Europeans, 16,000,000 Americans and more than 900,000 Australians are suffering from ‘some kind of mutual mental disorder or illusion‘.  If we were really serious about investigating this issue we would conduct studies using scientists with medical and biological backgrounds rather than just psychologists and/or electrical engineers”.

Symptoms after Exposure to Smart Meter Radiation report

 

Posted in ARPANSA, electromagnetic hypersensitivity (EHS), health | Tagged | 41 Comments

Inside the ‘quiet zone’, home to electrosensitives | Lateline

Posted on March 18, 2015 by Stop Smart Meters Australia

The tiny US town of Green Bank, West Virginia is in the ‘quiet zone’ – free from wireless communications due to the sensitivity of a high-powered telescope. That makes it attractive to ‘electrosensitives’ like Diane Schou – those who are unable to live with the frequencies emitted by modern electrical devices.

See: Lateline

 

Posted in Smart Meter | Tagged , | 7 Comments

Smart meters spiral | Herald Sun

Posted on March 13, 2015 by Stop Smart Meters Australia

Electricity smart meter fees have sucked up to $1000 from [Victorian] households….Energy Minister Lily D’Ambrosio did not directly answer why Victoria was the only state to order a digital meter rollout to homes and small businesses.

Full article from Herald Sun Consumer reporter Karen Collier can be found here. 

 

Posted in Smart Meter | Tagged , , | 31 Comments

Screening of MOBILIZE

Posted on March 11, 2015 by Stop Smart Meters Australia

Mobilize

Posted in Smart Meter | Tagged | Leave a comment

Study suggests Wi-Fi exposure more dangerous to kids than previously thought – Forbes Online

Posted on March 6, 2015 by Stop Smart Meters Australia

Most parents would be concerned if their children had significant exposure to lead, chloroform, gasoline fumes, or the pesticide DDT.  The International Agency for Research on Cancer (IRIC), part of the United Nations’ World Health Organization (WHO), classifies these and more than 250 other agents as Class 2B Carcinogens – possibly carcinogenic to humans.  Another entry on that same list is radiofrequency electromagnetic fields (RF/EMF).  The main sources of RF/EMF are radios, televisions, microwave ovens, cell phones, and Wi-Fi devices.

Uh-oh. Not another diatribe about the dangers of our modern communication systems?  Obviously, these devices and the resulting fields are extremely (and increasingly) common in modern society.  Even if we want to, we can’t eliminate our exposure, or our children’s, to RF/EMF.  But, we may need to limit that exposure, when possible.

That was among the conclusions of a survey article published in the Journal of Microscopy and Ultrastructure entitled “Why children absorb more microwave radiation than adults: The consequences.”  From an analysis of others studies, the authors argue that children and adolescents are at considerable risk from devices that radiate microwaves (and that adults are at a lower, but still significant, risk).  The following points were offered for consideration:

  • Children absorb a greater amount of microwave radiation than adults.
  • Unborn babies are even more vulnerable than children.  Therefore pregnant women should avoid exposing their fetus to microwave radiation.
  • Adolescent girls and women should not place mobile phones in their bras or in hijabs (headscarf).
  • Mobile phone manual warnings make clear an overexposure problem exists.
  • Government warnings have been issued but most of the public are unaware of such warnings.
  • Current exposure limits are inadequate and should be revised.
  • Wireless devices are radio transmitters, not toys.  Selling toys that use them should be monitored more closely.

Children and unborn babies absorb more microwave radiation, according to the authors, because their bodies are relatively smaller, their skulls are thinner, and their brain tissue is more absorbent.

For complete article published on Forbes Online please click here

Posted in Smart Meter | Tagged , , , , , , | 23 Comments

Wi-Fi Epidemic?

Posted on February 26, 2015 by Stop Smart Meters Australia

In some of Europe’s largest countries Wi-Fi has been banned from daycare centres and nurseries and more and more schools – but there is currently no similar moves here in Australia. Recently France banned wi-fi from centres where children under the age of 3 spend time.  Israel is investigating the effect of Wi-Fi upon school students.

Channel 7 news has reported that Wi-Fi exposure may be an epidemic in the making:

Report by Brian Seymour

Posted in Wi-Fi | Tagged , , , | 17 Comments

Former California Public Utilities Commission President Michael Peevey knew smart meters caused harm…..

Posted on February 22, 2015 by Stop Smart Meters Australia

In a 2010 email to PG&E, California Public Utilities Commission President Michael Peevey admits he knew smart meters caused harm and that he believed PG&E should do something about it, albeit “quietly”.

peevey-email-1-smart-meters

 

This video is a “must see”:

Evidence has now been made public of illegal actions and collusion between former California Public Utilities Commission president Michael Peevey and utility PG&E, as criminal investigations continue.

For more information see: http://www.takebackyourpower.net/news/2015/02/13/utility-commissioners-private-emails-reveal-conspiracy/

 

 

Posted in Smart Meter | Tagged , , | 8 Comments