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THE DAILY ASTORIAN • MONDAY, APRIL 8, 2019
OPINION
editor@dailyastorian.com
KARI BORGEN
Publisher
JIM VAN NOSTRAND
Editor
Founded in 1873
JEREMY FELDMAN
Circulation Manager
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Systems Manager
SOUTHERN EXPOSURE
Edward Stratton/The Daily Astorian
Tylor Olson, an installer with smart meter manufacturer Aclara, installs a unit on a house in Astoria for Pacifi c Power.
Are we smart to embrace smart meters?
I
f you Google “smart meter dangers,”
you may soon fear for your mito-
chondial functions like insomnia, tin-
nitus, fatigue, nausea, dizziness, irrita-
bility, listlessness, heart palpitations, and
changes in cognitive behavior.
In the monograph “Smart Meters:
Countdown to a National Crisis of Illness
and Death,” John P. Thomas suggests
millions will experience chronic disabil-
ity and fatal illness from exposure.
Our cell proteins will become “per-
manently altered” and we may suffer
for decades “with chronic fatigue, unex-
plained anxiety, and attention defi cits
until a life-threatening illness makes its
ugly appearance.”
Unlikely? Every power company and
most scientists would say the levels of
radiation are lower than the cellphones
pressed against our thighs.
In a Feb. 12 City Council work ses-
sion, Pacifi c Power’s Alisa Dunlap came
to Cannon Beach to introduce councilors
to smart meters at a work
session.
Residents ques-
tioned the safety of smart
meters, and lamented the
lack of public informa-
tion available.
R.J.
Resident Bob Thom
MARX
said smart meters are not
“entirely safe.” He was
concerned about the lack
of information presented by the city and
Pacifi c Power, and the lack of press cov-
erage given to the topic. He asked that
the changeover be delayed to educate the
public.
Former Seaside High School science
teacher Ed Johnson called smart meters a
“big money venture.”
“There’s been so little background
information put out to the general public
that’s not being provided by the corpo-
rations that are responsible for the tech-
nology,” Johnson said after the Cannon
Beach work session. “They didn’t even
vote on it, It was just coming. I wasn’t
very happy.”
The 5G network may adversely affect
humans and wildlife, he said. “You won’t
be able to go any place on this planet
without being impacted.”
In a similar presentation at Sea-
side City Hall, Frank Erickson, a retired
radiologist with an impressive list of
medical credentials, told city council-
ors he had “seesawed” whether to opt in
or opt out for smart meter installation at
his own home. “I’m still rethinking,” he
said.
Meet and greet
No wonder that the fi rst package
received at the Pacifi c Power meet and
greet March 5 at Seaside Brewing Co.
was a handout from the Utilities Telecom
Council, “No Health Threat from Smart
Meters.”
The same binder included the fact
sheet, “Electromagnetic Fields and Pub-
lic Health: Mobile Phones”; the mono-
graph “Radiofrequency Safety and Util-
ity Smart Meters,” Sept. 25, 2013; and
“Aclara’s response highlighting inaccura-
Pacifi c Power
Installers with manufacturer Aclara Technologies will install Pacifi c Power’s new smart power usage meters.
Pacifi c Power
Material presented by Pacifi c Power.
cies in ‘Evaluation of the Aclaral-210+C
AMI Meter,’” by William Bathgate.
Heavy titles, designed to counteract
the mountain of conspiracy theories, junk
science and speculation regarding higher
frequency radio waves.
Cory Estlund, manager of Pacifi c
Power’s fi eld support based in Portland,
is the guy whose job is to shake people
like us out of paranoia.
Smart meters are a more effi cient way
of gathering home energy usage details.
“Instead of having a meter reader come
out once a month, data is reported on a
real-time basis,” he said. “This is the fi rst
time we’ve been able to give you insight
into what you’re actually using.”
Smart meters have been in exis-
tence for almost 20 years, Estlund said.
They’re all manufactured by Aclara
Technologies, which bought out the
meter business from General Electric.
Today, there are more than 70 mil-
lion smart meters throughout the coun-
try. Estlund has had a smart meter in his
own Portland home since he moved in 15
years ago.
Future shock?
After watching Robert Redford and
Jane Fonda in “The China Syndrome”
almost 50 years ago, I learned never
take anything with radioactive material
for granted. The movie was released to
nuclear industry denials — and the tim-
ing couldn’t have been worse, followed
12 days after its opening by a meltdown
at the Three Mile Island nuclear plant
near Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.
Offi cial denials and industry cov-
er-ups, in not just the nuclear indus-
try but in many aspects of our lives, fol-
lowed through the decades: Love Canal;
the Hanford site; the Flint, Michigan,
water crisis; and the Boeing 737 MAX 8.
In the 1990s and early 2000s, I
remember covering many meetings on
the topic of cell towers. Towers were
ugly, for one thing, sprouting up on
mountains, hills and then farms and
backyards. And maybe unhealthy — but
one of the provisions of the 1996 Tele-
communications Act was to ban chal-
lenges to cell tower sitings based on
potential health impacts.
Now smart meters join the great cav-
alcade of American fears: fl uoride, cath-
ode-ray tubes, microwave ovens, pace-
makers to our ubiquitous cellphones, all
of which have the capacity to poison,
radiate, fry or otherwise contaminate us
in one way or another.
One of the documents presented at
the Seaside Brewing information session
included a white paper analysis of radio
frequency associated with “advanced
metering devices.”
While I didn’t understand a word of it,
I do like the word “advanced” better than
“smart” to describe these contraptions.
“Smart” gives it a human quality that
you don’t necessarily want in an elec-
tronic device, especially when it is
monitoring your electric orange-juice
squeezer.
It’s a little too close to another
famously intrusive device, the HAL 9000
computer in Stanley Kubrick’s “2001: A
Space Odyssey.”
“Good morning, Dave … How are
you this morning?”
R.J. Marx is editor of the Seaside Sig-
nal and Cannon Beach Gazette, and cov-
ers South County for The Daily Astorian.