Smart Meters, appliances, technology and the Internet of Things

Beware! Your new smart TV may soon be watching you!

Soon to be a thing of the past are those pleasant hot summer evenings sitting in front of your TV dressed only in your undies (or less) sipping a nice ice cold beer or iced coffee. Would you dare do so with a new smart TV where something (or someone) is able to watch you back? Better be well dressed, behave nicely and especially be careful what you say or perhaps the thought police may late one night be knocking at your door!

Smart meters too costly – 6PR Radio Interiew Perth

From Stop Smart Meters Australia:

Dec 18, 2012

Economic experts are calling the federal government’s push for smart metering the wrong move for consumers. Paul Murray spoke to Danny Price from Frontier Economics Australia who says the required investment for smart meters in Australia may not justify the cost.

Are smart meters an “electrical form of asbestos”?

Posted on December 13, 2012 by Stop Smart Meters Australia

CITY of Greater Dandenong is planning to refuse smart meters on council property, with one councillor questioning whether they’re “an electrical form of asbestos”.

Residents concerned about the health impacts of the digital meters have contacted several councillors asking for help to stop their installation.

In response, at the 10 December council meeting Paperbark Ward representative Peter Brown moved that the council oppose installation in its buildings and investigate their rights under the law to “opt out” of the program.

“Council is going to provide leadership in this matter,” he said.

Smart meters: Quebec’s “health tax” challenged

From André Fauteux

Smart meters: Quebec’s “health tax” challenged
Adapted from La Maison du 21e siècle magazine, Winter 2013 issue
By André Fauteux, Editor

Gaétane Boucher has lost everything: her family, her home, her job. While living in Granby, Quebec, the former industrial designer constantly suffered from severe headaches, numbness, dizziness, blurry vision and memory loss she related to electromagnetic field (EMF) exposure. “As a child, I lived in a house with radiant electric heating in the ceiling and I played regularly under powerlines – feet in the water to boot! – for 10 summers. I later acquired my electrosensitivity symptoms after working on a computer 8-10 hours a day for many years.

Swiss shortwave transmitter study and its relevance to smart meter exposure levels

During my recent series of talks in Melbourne on smart meter health effects I made mention of the Swiss Study on Health Effects of the Shortwave Transmitter Station of Schwarzenburg, Berne. In my opinion this is directly relevant to the radiofrequency (RF) exposures of people who have a wireless smart meter externally on a bedroom wall. Measurements taken in Melbourne on smart meters on bedroom walls have indicated that in this situation, nighttime smart meter exposure levels can exceed those levels associated with sleep disruption in the Swiss study. The following is from my old Electromagnetics Forum magazine from 1997.

Australian states want more details on power price plan

ABC News
States want more details on power price plan
AM By Lexi Metherell
December 3, 2012

The states say they need more details from the Federal Government about a plan to curb power price rises.
Prime Minister Julia Gillard yesterday announced plans to stop the “gold plating” of electricity networks.
Ms Gillard wants to give more funding to the national energy regulator and set up new consumer groups to keep power prices down.
She says the package will save consumers $250 a year on their power bills.

New smart meter report by the US National Institute for Science, Law & Public Policy

Too bad the Victorian government (present and former) didn’t have access to the just released report by the U.S. National Institute for Science, Law & Public Policy (Nov. 2012) before they committed to the current smart meter rollout. Titled Getting Smarter About the Smart Grid it should be required reading for Victorian regulators, the DPI, Energy Safe Victoria, etc. ESPECIALLY the clueless Victorian Ministerial Radiation Advisory Committee, who at the moment only get their advice from an ex-Motorola EMR strategist.

AND don’t forget the Greens who currently have absolutely no idea of the complexities of this issue.

Smart meter article in The Sydney Morning Herald: Smart move – but consumers pick up the costs

The Sydney Morning Herald
November 26, 2012
Michael West
Business columnist

DO WE really want to check our smart meters every time we turn on the dishwasher, take a shower or toast a slice of bread?

Has anybody wondered why almost every power company and lobby group in the country is pushing for the introduction of smart meters? It is worth pondering, for government, it seems, is about to fail the public again over energy policy.

First it was a faulty regulatory system which gave rise to ”gold-plating”, or overspending on networks, and spiralling power bills. The increase in ”peak demand” remains the industry catch cry to rationalise its rampant spending, even though peak demand has actually been falling for three years.

Night headaches after smart meter installed by bedroom

While the Victorian government continues to support a ubiquitous roll-out of smart meters, based on bad advice from industry spin doctors, the toll of people apparently adversely affected continues to mount. Does the gov’t think this all will conveniently disappear once their roll-out is completed? All their ‘eggs’ are in the nocebo basket – that is, they think its just all public hysteria. My advice is that they had better get legal advice for this is looking like an emerging public health crisis to which they have been forewarned, yet ignored.