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Citizen Demands ACC Challenge APS Smart Meter Propaganda

Smart Meters face radiation and fire hazard issues while failing to properly monitor electrical usage.

Smart Meters face radiation and fire hazard issues while failing to properly monitor electrical usage says many researchers, scientists and end users

Sedona AZ (February 10, 2013) – In a Letter to the SedonaEye.com editor, Arizona taxpayer Warren Woodward writes the Arizona Corporation Commission, Arizona Governor Jan Brewer, and elected representatives demanding that the ACC honor the commission’s state mandate to protect the public health and safety from corporate monopoly self-interests in the following letter subjected, APS Caught Lying While ACC Sleeps:

From: Warren Woodward

Subject: APS caught lying while ACC sleeps

To: Stump-web@azcc.gov, RBurns-web@azcc.gov, Burns-web@azcc.gov, Pierce-web@azcc.gov, BitterSmith-web@azcc.gov

Cc: pquinn@azruco.gov, cfraulob@azruco.gov, consumerinfo@azag.gov, “Rep. Brenda Barton” <bbarton@azleg.gov>, mailmaster@azcc.gov

Date: Thursday, February 7, 2013, 4:15 PM

Warren Woodward 
55 Ross Circle 
Sedona, Arizona 86336 

February 6, 2013

Arizona Corporation Commission logoArizona Corporation Commission (ACC)
1200 West Washington Street 
Phoenix, Arizona 85007 
Re: Docket # E-00000C-11-0328 

Commissioners,

I bring to your attention huge lies told by APS.

At your March 23, 2012 “smart” meter meeting, APS is on record as stating that their “smart” meters broadcast only once every 15 minutes, and additionally 14 times throughout the day – 8 times for “integral data” and 6 times for “register reads”.

You can witness that lie yourself starting at 5:08 pm in the video minutes of the meeting posted at your own ACC website. At the same time, the APS representative also brags about all the money and time that APS spent to supposedly verify these falsehoods.

Smart meter catches fire while in service

Smart meter catches fire while in service

Using a Gigahertz Solutions HF35C microwave analyzer, a top of the line piece of equipment perfect for measuring “smart” meter Radio Frequency (RF) emissions, I have spent 6 days measuring APS “smart” meters in Flagstaff, Prescott, Prescott Valley, Dewey-Humbolt and Phoenix. In all locations I have found “smart” meters broadcasting much more frequently than claimed by APS.

Additionally, APS presented their misinformation at your March, 2012 meeting in a way that implied an organized, clockwork-style pattern of “smart” meter broadcasts. Yet this is not how their system works in practice. I found that “smart” meters are broadcasting helter-skelter and pretty much non-stop.

For example, I might stand in front of a meter and nothing would happen for 3 minutes. Then it would broadcast twice in rapid succession. Then a minute or two would go by and it would broadcast again, then again after 5 minutes, etc. Sometimes I would find a meter that would broadcast 4 times in less than a minute.

There is no distinct pattern but one thing is for sure: APS has lied, big time. APS “smart” meters are broadcasting way, way more than what APS is on record as saying.

Something else is for sure too: You have not done your job. APS has gotten away with this lie while you fell asleep on duty.

aps logoI told you in person at your first “smart” meeting in September of 2011 that you could not take APS’s word for anything, and that you needed to do your own research. I also strongly advised you to buy an analyzer and conduct your own tests. You did nothing.

I brought the subject up again at your March 2012 meeting only to be told by the head of your Utilities Division that he had measured a “smart” meter with a Gauss analyzer and got no results.

Gauss meter

Gauss meter

Of course he got no results! “Smart” meters broadcast via microwave. Gauss analyzers measure magnetic field. In short, the poor fellow in charge of the Utilities Division for the Corporation Commission of the State of Arizona had no idea what he was doing. Since then I have brought his incompetence to your attention several times. And what have you done? “Nothing” would appear to be the answer once again.

After a year and a half of urging you to investigate APS’s absurd claimsand making it easy for you by telling you how to do it I finally concluded that you preferred to slumber and simply were not going to investigate.

I realized that if anyone was going to check on APS that it would have to be me, and at my own expense and on my own time.

All of you should be terribly ashamed for being slackers and letting Arizonans down. You make $79.5K (+ bennies) per year but can’t buy a $500 gadget to do some research?

ACC Commissioner Brenda Burns

ACC Commissioner Brenda Burns

You make $79.5K (+ bennies) to represent us and lead your staff yet you cannot ask your own staff to take a little money out of the roughly 5 million dollar Utilities Division budget to perform an independent test?

What the heck is wrong with you people?

Don’t you have any interest in truth? Have you no intellectual or professional curiosity? Don’t you care about the people you were elected to represent?

For the umpteenth time, you are supposed to be representing us, not the monopoly utilities. Yet it is myself and other independent citizens who have done all the research on this issue, research that you should have done. Worse still, when repeatedly presented with the truth on every aspect of this issue you seem incapable of recognizing it and choose to believe a pack of corporate liars instead.

ACC Chairman Bob Stumpf

ACC Chairman Bob Stump

I knew APS was lying as soon as they spoke the words. I knew because, unlike you or your staff, I have spent literally hundreds of hours researching this issue. Because of my research, I knew that if APS’s “smart” meters were broadcasting as infrequently as APS claimed then APS’s “smart” meters would be the only “smart” meters in the world that were doing so.

And this is not APS’s only lie. APS has told another whopper about RF.

In their “smart” meter “Myth vs. Fact” propaganda sheet, APS claims the RF of their “smart” meters to be .0009 milliwatts per square centimeter. Yet I found APS “smart” meters that were broadcasting more than 300% stronger than that – way more in fact than the RF I found while standing close to and measuring the RF of the 3 gigantic cell towers at Airport Mesa here in Sedona.

This is not the first time APS has lied to you.

ACC Commissioner Susan Bitter Smith

ACC Commissioner Susan Bitter Smith

They lied about analog meters being no longer available. And their CCST power point presentation given at your first meeting was filled with lies, their hired “scientist” exposed as a fraud. (Search the docket for corroboration of those points since they have all been substantiated many times over, both by myself and others.)

APS is an equal opportunity liar. They don’t just lie to you; they also lie to their customers.

The previously mentioned “Myth vs. Fact” sheet that they mail out to customers is a preposterous conglomeration of lies.

One APS customer I know was blatantly lied to about a bi-directional analog meter she requested APS install for use in conjunction with her solar system. After stringing her along for months promising her one, APS installed a digital meter and had the audacity to insist the digital meter was analog. I would describe that type of blatant lying as deranged and pathological.

Another person I know was told by APS that “smart” meters emit no EMF. Nonsense, even a toaster does.

ACC Commissioner Bob Burns

ACC Commissioner Bob Burns

I can provide more reports of APS’s lying upon request.

APS is so totally deceitful that their employees who answer the phone give out fake names and no last names. But they are such poor liars that in one instance I know of the APS employee on the phone could not remember which fake name she had given – “Sandy” became “Sue” in the same conversation!

Once someone lies to me their credibility is shot. How many more times does APS have to lie in order for you to wake up and get wise to them? How can you believe anything they tell you at this point?

In conclusion, it is way past the time for you to decide whose side you are on, the side of the public or the side of unprincipled, corporate liars whose only concern is money.

ACC Commissioner Gary Pierce

ACC Commissioner Gary Pierce

It is way past the time for you to wake up and realize that “smart” meters are a bio-hazard – a colossal mistake based totally on lies, and that they should be abandoned at once.

Sincerely,

Warren Woodward

PS – I want this posted to the docket as evidence that Commissioners were given the facts should that become necessary in any future lawsuits. 

Cc: Governor Jan Brewer, Attorney General Tom Horne, State Representative Brenda Barton

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9 Comments

  1. Can these people be recalled or sued?

  2. N. Baer says:

    If they had the knowledge and did not act on it.

  3. Warren says:

    Let’s put the recent ACC-approved APS rate hike in some perspective.

    From APS’s parent company Pinnacle West’s website:

    “subsidiary APS is the second fastest growing electric utility in the U.S. over the last five years”
    ( http://www.pinnaclewest.com/aboutus/Pages/Company-Overview.aspx )

    Proposed double and triple bonuses for the APS fat-cats (Must be those “operational savings” they got from firing meter readers, along with the 8 to 10% they make on their bogus ‘smart’ grid “capital improvement” expenditures):

    Dec 28, 2012
    APS offering executives potential bonuses for 2013

    Patrick O’Grady
    Managing Editor- Phoenix Business Journal

    Arizona Public Service Co. has set up some potential bonuses for its executives next year, based primarily on the utility’s financial performance.

    In a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission through its parent, Pinnacle West Capital Corp., the company’s board approved bonuses that could double or triple execs’ pay if APS does well in 2013.

    The award potential represents an increase from previous executive bonuses, according to a proxy filing by Pinnacle West last year. The bonus structure depends on specific criteria involving revenue and a host of other factors, depending on the person involved, according to documents filed with the SEC.

    Five APS execs were listed in the program:

    • Don Brandt, chairman and CEO of APS (and chairman, president and CEO of Pinnacle West), could receive awards of 50 to 200 percent of his base salary. For 2011, the most recent year available, Brandt received awards of $1.6 million on top of his $1.1 million salary. [Actually a previous PBJ article had his yearly pay adding up to 5.66 million – including stock “awards” and a 1.4 million “incentive plan” -http://www.bizjournals.com/phoenix/news/2011/04/11/donald-brandt-earns-566m-in-first.html]

    • Don Robinson, president and chief operating officer of APS, could receive between 37.5 and 150 percent of his base salary in awards. In 2011, he received $647,820 in incentives and his base salary was $610,000.

    • Randy Edington, executive vice president and chief nuclear officer, can earn between 12.5 and 100 percent of his base salary as a bonus. He also has a separate agreement for $125,000 for specific performance achievements at the Palo Verde Nuclear Generating Station. In 2011, Edington earned $645,460 in incentives in addition to his $800,000 salary.

    • James Hatfield, executive vice president and chief financial officer, and David Falck, executive vice president and general counsel, can earn between 60 and 120 percent of their salary as bonuses. In 2011, Hatfield had a salary of $490,000 and received $292,653 in incentives; Falck had a salary of $473,000 and received $282,499 in incentives.

    ( http://www.bizjournals.com/phoenix/news/2012/12/28/aps-offering-executives-potential.html?ana=yfcpc )

    Now, on top of the rate hike, APS wants us to pay extra to not have a bio-harzardous surveillance device (AKA “smart” meter) attached to our house.

    Wake up, people. We are being scammed.

  4. Investigators in the DC area found the same thing I did here with APS.

    The electric companies are lying as to how often and how strongly “smart” meters are broadcasting.

    3 minute news clip from TV station WUSA9:

    http://www.wusa9.com/video/default.aspx?bctid=2176584039001&odyssey=mod

    The Arizona Corporation Commission (ACC) has shirked their responsibility to protect the public on this issue.

    In what appears to be an attempt to hide the truth, the ACC has also refused to place my recent letter of findings (printed above) in their “smart” meter docket.

  5. I really appreciate all the work that has gone into alerting the customer of this crime. I have just found out about this. I wonder if it relates to my tinnitus? My neighbor said his tinnitus (ringing in the ears) stopped 2 months after removing the so called Smart Meter. Feel free to contact me on philippa.winkler@nau.edu if you have information about this aspect.
    What is despicable is that now we have to PAY to remove something we weren’t informed properly about in the first place!! And the Commission hasn’t decided how much I will have to pay.

  6. N. Baer says:

    Passing it on ” Los Angeles Teacher’s Union Passes Resolution to Ensure Safety from Hazardous Electromagnetic Fields (EMF) in Schools including EMF Emissions from Wireless Technology

    News Release, March 7, 2013

    United Teachers Los Angeles… (UTLA), representing over 40,000 teachers and other workers in LAUSD, passed the following motion by a sweeping majority last night at 9 PM.

    (Motion for the new UTLA Resolution transcribed from attendee, Shane Gregory’s transcripts):

    —————————————————————————-

    Health and Human Services Committee 3-6-13 #1: Moved by Kevin Mottus, seconded by John Cabrera.

    “I move that UTLA will abide by current National NEA Policy for Environmentally Safe Schools which states that all employees and stakeholders should be informed when there are changes in their exposure to environmental hazards including electromagnetic radiation and that all stakeholders and the public should be notified of any actual and potential hazards. UTLA will advocate for technological solutions that maintain technology upgrades while not increasing employees exposure to electromagnetic radiation.”

    Rationale: The NEA National Policy Resolution C-18 Environmentally Safe Schools states as follows:

    “C-18 Environmentally Safe Schools

    The National Education Association believes that all educational facilities must have healthy indoor air quality, be smoke-free, and be safe from environmental and chemical hazards, and from hazardous electromagnetic fields…

    The Association further believes that school districts must inform all stakeholders when changes in their exposure to electromagnetic radiation occur. Additional health hazards should not be created when facilities are altered or repaired.

    The Association believes that school districts must post MSDS and OSHA standards. Students and/or their parents/guardians, education employees, and the public should be notified of actual and potential hazards. All stakeholders should be involved in developing a plan for corrective action. The Association also believes in the development and enforcement of health and safety standards specifically for children. (1989, 2004).”

    In May of 2011 based on the latest research, The World Health Organization classified electromagnetic fields as a Class 2B Carcinogen along with Lead and DDT. Current FCC guidelines for electromagnetic radiation explicitly do not cover children or pregnant women. According to NEA Policy our employees have the right to know about changes in their environment which may have adverse health effects.”

    —————————————————————————–
    The NEA’s National Policy ‘Resolution C-19 Environmentally Safe Schools’ can be found at (p53):

    C-19. Environmentally Safe Schools Cited from 2013 NEA Resolutions http://www.nea.org/assets/docs/nea-resolutions-2012-13.pdf

    The National Education Association believes that all educational facilities must have healthy indoor air quality, be smoke-free, be safe from environmental and chemical hazards, and be safe from hazardous electromagnetic fields.

    School districts should conduct periodic testing for harmful water and airborne particles/agents that are detrimental to the health of students and education employees and shall report the results publicly. Further, school districts must complete corrective actions to eliminate the problems and report results in a timely manner.

    The Association also believes that it is incumbent on local education providers to be forthcoming with information regarding mold infestation and other indoor environmental hazards in school facilities.

    The Association also believes in the establishment and enforcement of standards of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), including temperature and humidity recommendations, to ensure health and safety. The Association further believes that pesticide use should be minimized and, if used, advance notice given of location and date of application.

    The Association supports ongoing training and certification of education employees who work in potentially hazardous situations. This training must include proper handling, storage, and disposal of hazardous materials and instruction on Materials Safety Data Sheets (MSDS).

    Additional health hazards should not be created when facilities are altered or repaired.

    The Association believes that school districts must post MSDS and OSHA standards. Students and/or their parents/guardians, education employees, and the public should be notified of actual and potential hazards. All stakeholders should be involved in developing a plan for corrective action. The Association also believes in the development and enforcement of health and safety standards specifically for children. (1989, 2009) ”

    For more information on opposition to the School District’s $500 million Wi-Fi technology adoption plan, see

    http://saferemr.blogspot.com/2013/02/testimony-in-opposition-to-lausd-wi-fi.htmlSee More

    http://www.nea.org/assets/docs/nea-resolutions-2012-13.pdf
    http://www.nea.org

  7. john lee says:

    Would like warren woodwards e-mail to correspond. I have just opted out of aps smart meter and am spreading the word around our community about what aps doesn’t want people to know.

  8. Warren says:

    @ john lee — w6345789 at yahoo dot com

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