Action Alert:: Contact Your Public Service Commission about Fires and Smart Meters

Action Alert

Contact Your Public Service Commission about Fires and Smart Meters

Volume 3 Edition 40

August 29, 2012

Delegate Glass (MD - D) and concerned resident

Contact Your Public Service Commission about Fires and Smart Meters

On August 16th, PECO, the power company serving the Philadelphia area, announced that it is temporarily halting smart meter installations due to 15 fires in the area linked with smart meters. Citing this development, the Maryland Public Service Commission held a hearing on August 28^th to question four Maryland utility companies about any malfunctions with deployed smart meters.

At the hearing, Maryland utility executives reported no fires associated with newly installed smart meters. Yet, Karen Lefkowitz, Pepco Holdings' vice president of business transformation, admitted that installing any electric meter always poses a small risk of fire.

Delegate Glen Glass (D-MD) who introduced HB 878 in the Maryland General Assembly enabling customers to retain their analog meters, attended the hearing. He stated, "The testimony that I heard only confirmed that Smart Meters are dangerous, intrusive, and have a tendency to break and overheat."

Maryland Smart Meter Awareness has used the hearing as an opportunity to gain more press coverage, raise awareness and demonstrate continuing opposition to smart meters. Although the public and interveners were not allowed to testify at the hearing, Maryland Smart Meter Awareness held a press conference to express its views just before the hearing. The press coverage (see reading rack below) is enabling more people in Maryland to learn about smart meter concerns.

Perhaps due to the press coverage, the Maryland Public Service Commission announced today that it is providing an opportunity for other parties to the proceedings to comment on the risks of electrical overheating and malfunctions posed by further deployment of smart meters and the adequacy of the responses to the Pennsylvania reports of fires associated with smart meters. This development will allow intervenors to keep this story on the front burner and in the press.

Use this sample letter to contact your Public Service/Utilities Commission and request that it immediately convene a hearing about the health and safety of smart meters. Or, use your own remarks and cite the recent Maine Supreme Court order that called for the Maine Public Utilities Commission to address the safety aspects of smart meters.

India Requires Cell Phone Labels and Lowers RF Standards

Effective September 1, India will require labels showing the Specific Absorption Rate (SAR) on all imported and domestic cell phones. The SAR limit has been lowered to 1.6 watt/kg, averaged over 1 gram of tissue (the same as the US). The country's radiofrequency radiation exposure limit will be reduced to 1/10 the current level. We are pleased that India is taking a lead on lowering its standards. http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/New-mobile-radiation-norms-from-Sept-1/articleshow/15499480.cms

Contact Your Favorite Restaurant About This Great Marketing Idea

Eva Restaurant (a restaurant in the Los Angeles area) offers a 5% discount to patrons who give up their cell phones so that they can focus on their non-digital companions and the restaurant experience. Customers hand over their cell phones to their servers at the beginning of the meal and pick the phones up on the way out of the restaurant. This small restaurant was featured in a San Francisco Chronicle news article and the manager was interviewed on NPR radio.

Encourage your favorite restaurant to adopt a similar policy and suggest it will gain well-deserved headlines. Wouldn't it be nice to go to a restaurant without cell phones? Tell the restaurant you will start a social media campaign to promote the new policy. It would be great to have restaurants sans cell phones in every major city or county!

Harmonic Convergence 2 - September 22

On September 22nd, people around the world will gather to participate in Harmonic Convergence 2. The event will call attention to issues including GMOs, pesticides, fracking, pharmaceuticals and vaccines, smart meters and wireless radiation, weather control (HAARP/chemtrails), and pollution by industry and warfare. These are not future issues; they now threaten the survival of humanity and wildlife as we know them. If you would like to organize an event in your area, read the event press release at http://www.harmonicplanet.org/mod/page/view.php?id=3

Healthy Bodies, Healthy Buildings Conference - October 11-16

Please check out Institute for Bau Biology and Ecology (www.hbelc.org) and register for the Annual Conference in the Washington, DC area October 11-16, 2012. Dr. William Rea, founder of the Environmental Health Center in Dallas, Texas, Dr. Martin Blank of Columbia University, and Camilla Rees, MBA will be headlining the event with several other experts on the biological health impact of electromagnetic fields, and in smart grid technologies. Come hear phenomenal speakers such as Devra Davis, PhD of the Environmental Health Trust, best selling author of Disconnect, Ann Louise Gittleman, NY Times award-winning author of Zapped, Jim Turner, Esq. of Citizens for Health and the National Institute for Science, Law and Public Policy, smart grid technology expert Tim Schoechle, PhD, bau biologist Tom Wilson, BSEE, Duncan Campbell, Esq. of Living Dialogues, and Christine Hoch of the Center for Safer Wireless. You can also interact with other experts-architects, engineers, interior designers, physicians, corporate health professionals-for green lifestyle tips and tricks. Won't you join me for the nation's leading conference and training institute on healthy and eco-conscious living? Register here: www.hbelc.org

Add the Public News Service to Your Media Contacts

When issuing press releases, we often get a limited response from the press. Add the Public News Service to your media list because you may have a better chance of attracting press coverage. The news service distributes public interest news about social, community, or environmental issues to mass media and alternative news outlets on a daily basis. It has news producers in 35 states across the US. According to its website, "Our stories examine the effects of policy on areas that receive too little coverage, lifting up often marginalized voices and making greater journalistic breadth available to broadcasters and publishers on any platform."