Your power is about to get BRIGHTER” (and your health is about to get worse)
BY NICK ROGERS
GEAUGA - Over two weeks ago, this author received a pamphlet in his mailbox from FirstEnergy (you know, the electric utility company at the heart of the HB 6 scandal?). The pamphlet features a wireless “Smart” meter on the cover with the title, “Your power is about to get BRIGHTER,” and the subtitle “An introduction to Smart Meters for your home.” After placing the letter next to his computer to “deal with” at a later date, this author decided to do something about it (if nothing more than venting a bit and hopefully making a few more Ohioans aware of what’s coming if they happened to throw the pamphlet in the trash along with the Penny Saver).
Smart meters are an essential part of the Smart grid, working together with fiberoptic lines, cell towers, and “small cells” located on buildings and light poles to enable the “Internet of Things (IoT)” and the “Internet of People (IoP),” aka 6G technology. As FirstEnergy explains it in their pamphlet, information is sent, wirelessly, from your home to a “Utility Access Point” to a Wireless Area Network (WAN), and ending up – we can only hope – at First Energy. As the company points out, the “ongoing investment” toward “a more modernized electric system” (known as “Power Forward” here in Ohio) has been approved by the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio (PUCO), the “regulatory” agency supposedly tasked with keeping the likes of FirstEnergy in check; an agency with a track record of corruption and corporate crime facilitation.
When this author wrote “we can only hope” above, it was a reference to the fact that Smart meters are easily hackable and, indeed, there is documented evidence of this having happened via nefarious third parties here in Ohio. The fallout from such data theft is very real.
But don’t worry. FirstEnergy addresses this issue in their pamphlet.
The next “Q & A” reads as follows: “Q: Will you limit the amount of electricity I am allowed to use?” FirstEnergy says no, but House bills are popping up – like HB 427 – which could hand over remote control of Ohioans’ thermostats in the name of “demand management” (aka conserving electricity from our strained grid to be gobbled up by data centers).
But perhaps the most egregious lie – and the way the pamphlet ends – has to do with Smart meters and human health.
As has been well-documented by the likes of Scientists for Wired Technology, Children’s Health Defense, Environmental Health Trust, The Ohio Register, and countless others from academia to activist circles, the “pulsed, data-modulated, Radiofrequency Microwave Radiation” released by Smart meters 24 hours a day (often just outside people’s bedrooms) is deeply destructive to the human biological system. This author would like to see a reference or two from FirstEnergy corroborating just how “safe” these devices really are.
On their website, they assure us that the meters they’re installing are “UL [Ultimate Liars?] certified and have been tested and demonstrated by manufacturers to be safe and secure.” Ah, tested by the manufacturers. Got it.
But don’t worry, FirstEnergy is deeply sorry about their past transgressions, and they vow to be completely transparent in their business operations going forward.
FirstEnergy claims that Smart meters will provide many benefits. “They reduce the number of estimated bills through automated readings, help us respond to power outages more quickly and help customers learn more about their energy use,” their website boasts.
This author opted out of a Smart meter many months ago as soon as the plans for a changeover began surfacing, and he is literally paying the price. SW Ohio for Responsible Technology (SWORT) and others have fought to introduce ballot measures giving Ohioans the legal right to opt out without punitive fees, but most politicians have been reluctant to back such legislation. The biggest supporter of this type of legislation, to this author’s knowledge, was Sedrick Denson, but he resigned last year with no such bill drafted.
So what happens when FirstEnergy decides to no longer employ meter readers and they say, “It’s a Smart meter on your home or you’ll live in the dark”? Well, that day hasn’t come yet, but it feels like it will.
Do you consent?
