Dear Editor,
Re: Frustrated with smart meter opponents, Thursday, Nov. 28 edition of the Merritt Herald by Darrel Brooks
This is not the first time you have rudely and argumentatively interrupted one of our meetings. Did you not notice that Brian Thiesen asked the crowd for approval of your stay and we unanimously said goodbye? You are not ever there to debate, but rather to interrupt and bluster.
I am frustrated by your remarks. They shows you do not have knowledge about smart meters. Therefore, you should do some homework instead of promoting ignorance about smart meters.
1. Bullied “trained” installers? Corix used ads in local newspapers to recruit two-week wonders who could have no electrical training to install (sometimes incorrectly) an electrical appliance. By the way, some installations were accomplished by stealth, deceit and bullying, even with posters that say not to exchange the meters. They were paid by the install, so some were installed at night or when property owners were absent.
2. As we in the no-smart meter group know, nothing is using the ZigBee chip in the smart meter at present as BC Hydro and the Liberals have not built the towers or the computer banks to gather this data. When this is accomplished, then the smart meter will emit electrical magnetic frequencies — but not before. If you did not have an agenda and actually watched the documentary Take Back Your Power, you would have seen plants around an emitting smart meter in Ontario that were dead. I have seen pictures of operating smart meters that have killed beehives and caused bats to relocate. I have read of the agony that cancer chemotherapy recipients have endured when they return home and are further bombarded by an operating smart meter.
3. The story that BC Hydro wants us to believe is that the meters only pulse once a day. When operating, the ZigBee chip will monitor power, water, and gas. The information gathered will be stored not in the meter as you suggest, but in the computer banks. Since the ZigBee chip does not store, it operates when any of the four functions are being operated. It may be the case that the ZigBee chip in the smart meter communicates with the Hydro data banks two to three times a day. But the gathering by this chip in the meter on the residence is 24/7. We will be bombarded constantly in our own homes with electric magnetic frequencies. Your retained private information could be made available and sold to third parties if not at a corporation’s request than by hacking. Can you imagine the confusion that would ensue if the power grid was hacked and traffic lights were out in any large city? Think opportunity for terrorism. Regarding our ‘Privacy Act’ — when we used this act for our protection, BC Liberals quietly changed this act to enable the smart meter install. That was devious, but also proved that B.C. residents opposed to this whole install were on the right track.
4. Information gathered by the utility company could be used to present “time of use” — that means the price of electricity depends on when it’s used.
Don’t believe me? Check out what happened at Hydro One in Ontario.
The dream of a worldwide grid is exactly that. It will never happen because too many countries are opposed to smart metering.
Are you employed as an antagonist by BC Hydro? That would explain your bluster.
Mo Tomchuk
Merritt
