By Dan Aceto

Staff Writer

Residents, health practitioners, public advocates, engineers and representatives from Central Maine Power Co. weighed in on the safety of smart meters during a five-hour open forum Monday in Scarborough.

The forum was preceded by an Oct. 20  Town Council meeting where residents spoke out against potential health and safety risks from the meters. The council subsequently passed a resolution asking CMP to delay installation of smart meters in town until the company could respond to residents’ concerns.

CMP has installed 10,750 smart meters in South Portland since it began in September and about 1,000 in Cape Elizabeth. CMP spokesman John Carroll said the company has installed 56,000 meters across the state and that the project is scheduled to be completed by early 2012.

Some residents are concerned radio frequencies emitted by the wireless meters may cause illness or be susceptible to breaches of security. CMP has repeatedly stated the meters are safe and has already begun installation throughout Greater Portland. 

Although CMP was not legally bound to honor the request for an open forum, the company agreed to the meeting to address residents’ concerns. The public forum attracted residents from Scarborough, South Portland, Cape Elizabeth and other communities.

Town Manager Tom Hall, who concluded the forum at midnight before the issue of security could be discussed, said he is talking to CMP about scheduling a second forum. He said he doesn’t think more meters will be installed before a second forum. 

Elizabeth Kelley, founder of the Electro-Magnetic Safety Alliance in Arizona, was invited to the forum by Elisa Boxer-Cook, a resident of Scarborough, to speak against their use. Kelley said smart meter technology is increasing and health factors should be considered before their use becomes widespread. 

 “People are continually being exposed to high levels of radiation,” Kelley said. “I’m concerned about the physical and biological effects on our health.”

Kelley said the Federal Communications Commission has standards in place only for safety of thermal waves – or waves that heat body tissue – that are emitted from electromagnetic devices such as smart meters. She said no tests have been performed on effects of non-ionizing thermal radio waves that come from the devices.

Kelley also said she is concerned about long-term effects of radio frequencies given off by meters in neighborhoods and said more time is needed to study their effects.

“Some people are scared and leaving their homes and some people are making a lot of money. Maybe it’s time to reconsider the plan,” Kelley said. 

Michelle Hertz, a New York resident whose son attends college in Maine, has followed the debate in Scarborough because of her own experience with smart meters.

Hertz said two months after electric company Con Edison installed meters on her house and in her neighborhood, she became ill and had trouble focusing and sleeping at night. She noticed after going outside and getting away from her house that she felt better and became concerned the meter was to blame.

Eventually Hertz was able to convince the company to replace the smart meter with an older analog meter. She said that after the switch her thinking became clear again and buzzing in her ears ceased.

Although she feels the electric companies are not intentionally trying to hurt people, she said they are making a “terrible mistake and that people will suffer.”

Julie Tupper of South Portland also says she has experienced problems she thinks are caused by wireless technology.

Tupper said she can feel the presence of electromagnetic waves and removed all wireless devices from her house, including her cell phone, when she began to feel sick. 

Tupper said her symptoms have worsened since Smart Meters were installed in her neighborhood and that she has experienced disrupted sleep patterns and nausea. She said she contacted CMP to ask whether the meters’ frequencies could penetrate the walls and was told they were not designed to do that, but was not given a yes or no answer.
 Kelley said CMP needs to take the concerns of residents seriously, especially those with a history of seizures, medical implants and other sensitivities and “go back to the drawing board.”
“You can treat symptoms, but you need to treat the cause,” Kelley said.

Carroll, the CMP spokesman, said the meters are harmless and are merely a wireless digital upgrade of current meters. Older models are hard-wired and do not emit the same radio frequencies as smart meters. Carroll likened their use to that of an iPhone, which gives users greater interactivity. He said the meters are an important step forward from the “primitive” system currently in place. 

“The technology we use today is a contemporary of the telegraph and has been in use for over 100 years. We don’t use horseback anymore, people use trucks,” Carroll said.

Carroll said users will be able to track usage in real time and will be able to change their habits of use to save money and reduce their carbon footprint. 

Carroll said that while CMP does not currently offer the service, meters will enable the use of “dynamic pricing,” where consumers choose different electricity plans to save money by using appliances during off-peak hours of use. 

“The end result is that this will provide a faster, better and more informative technology,” said Carroll.

Dr. Yakov Shkolnikov, a managing engineer from Exponent, the firm hired by CMP to respond to consumers’ complaints, has had more than 30 peer-reviewed papers published on the topic of electromagnetic waves. 

Shkolnikov said smart meters are in use .43 seconds during a day and 10 percent of the signal is sent toward homes. The maximum range of the signal is about a mile and the strength of each meter weakens the further it goes. 

Shkolnikov said only one smart meter will be on at a given time in a small proximity and access points used to collect signals from individual units will be mounted 30 feet high and 20 feet from buildings. There will be one access point per 816 meters.

Shkolnikov said people shouldn’t be concerned with periodic “bursts” of radio frequencies from the meters and that cell phones emit similar “bursts” up to 13,000 times a day to conserve power and perform other functions. He said the total amount of exposure from radio frequencies would be no different than that from a cell phone call made by a neighbor across the street.

Rep. Andrea Boland (D-Sanford) asked why CMP decided to make the switch to wireless when hard-wire alternatives have proven as effective. She also wanted to know whether taxpayers would foot the bill for additional expenses of installing meters. 

Carroll said wireless meter technology is used in many countries outside the United States and that in Maine the technology is especially useful because it enables the company to reach the furthest areas of the state without building additional plants.

Carroll said the $166 million cost of smart meters is funded in part by a $96 million grant from the Department of Energy and that because funding came from a federal grant, taxpayers will be responsible for half the cost. He said CMP will offset that cost through savings from the more efficient new meters. 

Cape Elizabeth resident Dick Brennan said he is concerned about how many jobs will be lost in the transition from the old system to the new because meters will no longer be serviced monthly by technicians.

Like supermarket self-scanners and self-service gas pumps, Carroll said CMP is “another business adapting to technology” and the company is making efforts to retrain workers who will lose jobs and help them find other positions in the company if possible.

Several doctors in Maine echoed comments of people concerned they’ll be adversely affected by the meters.

Dr. Sean McCloy, who practices holistic medicine at Maine Integrative Wellness in Portland, said at first he was skeptical of concerns over smart meters, but has realized some of his patients are sensitive to electromagnetic waves.

“We are exposed on a daily basis by things that hurt us just a little bit. Some are susceptible and others don’t feel a thing,” McCloy said. “What really comes to mind is that we should prove this stuff is safe before we move forward and expose the public in a massive experiment.”

McCloy said mandatory installation of the meters in neighborhoods is unfair to residents who have safety concerns. 

“You talk about the choice of variable rate, but where is the choice to opt out of the program?” McCloy asked. 

CMP has said it will not offer residents the option to opt out of the smart meter program because the Department of Energy grant for the work specifically calls for installation of wireless meters.

Dr. Magili Chapman Quinn, a physician at Osteopathic Family Medicine in Falmouth and Portland, said she is afraid CMP has forged ahead without being fully informed on the subject.

“We’re only human and we don’t always know the answers or the right questions to ask,” she said. 

Scarborough resident Suzanne Foley Ferguson said she has done research on the topic and that for every study Exponent shows in support of smart meters, she could match them twofold with an argument against the meters.
 “Uncertainty demands caution,” Foley Ferguson said. “It took 30 years before cigarettes were determined carcinogenic.”

Scarborough resident Jim Sanuk, a former bio-medical technician at Maine Medical Center, agreed. 

Sanuk said he is aware of concerns about radio frequencies from cell phones possibly interfering with equipment  in hospitals and is worried there may be other dangers experts have yet to discover about the meters.

“There are many things we learned down the road that we didn’t know today, such as (the dangers of) lead poisoning. I’m worried about the kids and what the possibilities may be 20 years down the road.”

Staff Writer Dan Aceto can be reached at 282-4337, ext. 237.