Posted on 07/19/2012 3:41:33 PM PDT by Rennes Templar
A woman in Texas says she tried to be polite when she told the man from the power company that she didn't want to have her old electric meter replaced with a new "smart" meter. But when he refused to listen to her, she grabbed her gun.
The woman tells Houston's KHOU that she placed herself between the installer and her old meter but, "He just kept pushing me away."
That's when she showed him her handgun.
"He saw it, and went back the other way," she tells KHOU.
The homeowner says she is not comfortable with the amount of information smart meters transmit back to the power company.
"Our constitution allows us not to have that kind of intrusion on our personal privacy," she explains. "They’ll be able to tell if you are running your computer, air conditioner, whatever it is."
The woman still has her old meter and she and her husband have posted warning signs declaring "No Smart Meters Are to Be Installed On This Property," but CenterPoint, the power company that attempted to install the meter says it will persist in its efforts.
"We are deeply troubled by anyone who would pull a gun on another person performing their job," reads a statement from the company. "CenterPoint will be taking additional steps – including court actions – because what happened is dangerous, illegal and unwarranted."
KHOU reports that CenterPoint Energy already installed around 2 million smart meters in the area, but the local Public Utilities Commission is now weighing the possibility of allowing homeowners to have the new meters removed.
A grounded single phase hookup is still AC.
But even if it was DC, she could still power an inverter off that DC and supply her own AC.
The tax collection function they perform on your utility bill.
The way they collude with the PUC to pump the rate base with everything from tree trimming to line maintenance.
The carbon "market" as a tool for redistribution of income (and if you think the utility companies in California didn't want that, I give you John Bryson).
Reporting people without a warrant for odd electrical usage patterns as indication of a drug operation.
Need more?
Still, you are under no obligation to purchase anything from them.
The smart meter has a signal generator feeding RF signal to the line itself. This particular technology is as old as the railway telegraph (the original radio) ~ the concept was demonstrated as early as 1832.
If you are having difficulties with that device's signal, have a dentist check your fillings.
You're right, it would be hard to tell. Not impossible, there are characteristics of an air-conditioner load (a spike when the motor starts up, etc) that can be looked for. They would probably guess right 95+% of the time.
Look for new AC units (and other high power appliances) to have government mandated electronics to interface with smart meters (probably through signals sent through the power line) once smart meters become ubiquitous.
The 2nd Amendment might be the best way to remove the meter. Target practice.
This issue is being fought in Nevada legislature in next session.
More importantly, though, is can she run her extra large super duper has water and juice faucets and ice cube maker with the freezer big enough for an elk?
That is exactly what I was thinking
Modern LED lights allow you to fool the erratic power usage traces. Plus they are cool enough you don’t need to run an AC just for your grow rooms!
You have no worries: just use your fearsome HTML skills to make a nice, safe <TABLE> box around it for protection...
Depends on how much DC.
Xantrex has a 5,000 watt inverter listed.
Will them smart meters run backwards if you plug them in upside down, like the old meters?
It would take way too much bandwidth, RF or over the power lines, to report instantaneous power consumption from hundreds of thousands of consumers in the area. Per the official statement the meter reports the data every 15 minutes.
I can understand that in some instances it could be revealing too much - it can show the difference between a drug growing operation (24/7 constant load) vs. someone who likes to bathe in hot water and then sit in front of electric fireplace all night long.
But for majority of customers and loads the readings are too coarse to be of any use. I personally installed a power meter in my house, and it reports several channels every second. (It reports to me, not to anyone else.) This resolution in time is sufficient for me to tell one load from another, especially because I can calibrate the surge shape and then recognize it later. My water heater, for example, is a single 4.5 kW load with double the spike on startup. But that's only because I know what it is. Nobody can tell if I turn a TV on, or a computer, or a floor lamp, or most other loads that I have around. Some of those loads are automatically controlled, so you can't even know if someone is at home or not.
Many people are afraid of smart meters, but truth be told they are not the worst thing that can happen. Electric companies cannot afford the old style meters anymore - they are not accurate enough and they require human readers. The new meters are DSP-based, fast enough to digitize all the harmonics worth measuring, and the power factor for them is a piece of cake. They can also be utilized on time-of-use rate plans. Not every FR reader has solar panels on the roof or a Volt in the garage, but electric companies are not FR readers. They only are in it for profit; if they think that there is profit in catering to EV or solar then here you are. Meters are their property, and for all moral reasons they should be able to install them. The same moral reasons allow you to either cancel the service or to mislead the people in black helicopters by moving the load around as it pleases you.
Contractually, maybe, but practically, no. Given the codes, just try living within the limits of any city and installing any other source of power.
That's assault, on her property. He's lucky to be alive. I don't brandish and I don't fight fair. She should file charges.
“If he was on her property and she told him to leave, he was trespassing”
Not to mention he pushed her out of the way two times so that would be assault.
Lordy, you are indeed an ignorant putz.
Try reading and understanding a FReeper's post before opening yer yap next time.
These smartmeters have really caused problems for some people. The power they actually transmit at has been found to be much higher than claimed by power companies, and also a lot more often than stated -every 6 seconds instead of once a minute, as checked by an em rf meter.
On some older houses it’s started fires due to older wiring and some have actually melted shortly within a day or two of installation. Some people have experienced problems with the transmit frequencies.
Since when do power companies have the right to set up transmission modules on our property. These people don’t mind regular metering, they didn’t give per mission to set up a microwave transmitter.
Anything else in my house that transmits, I can either change to cable transmission, or decide I don’t want it in my home. ‘That’s a big difference’between the government sanctioned monopolostic power company forcing this on people and it’s either this or no power.
Who are they selling the data to?
Do the police get to see the data, to see if someone’s home?
They already use the data to “shame” you if you use more energy than your neighbors. Now you’ll have to justify why to them. Personally I have pets that require certain temperatures, but the hell if I will explain it to them. I pay the effing bill.
Power company has easement rights to be on the property and service their equipment.
The issue is they never got the right to set up microwave transmitters from the property owner, just a meter to record power usage.
If you could buy it from someone else people would have a choice, but they are government approved monopolies so there is no free market choice. Otherwise you could get power from someone else.
But metering power usage and setting up a microwave transmitter on your property are two very different things. These people have no problem being metered, they never gave permission to have microwave transmitters set up on their property, much less big brother real-time observation of their usage habits. We already have evidence power companies are coming back to people trying to get on their cases for using more energy than their surrounding neighbors.
With the new generation of smart appliances they will be able to tell what is running and when.
You can decide not to have internet service or get it a different way - not so with a government approved monopoly power company - the only guy in town, no choice. Hardly the same comparison.
Easement means they have access to their property on her property.
With interest, I hope, and “late charges”?
People fantasize about dueling. Some guy insults your wife, your honor, your dog, whatnot, and in the fantasy you duel and you show him. The reality is that a lot of older men, and barely men (very young) lost their lives to men in their prime. Approaching 50 myself I can readily see why dueling isn’t such a grand idea.
People fantasize about dueling. Some guy insults your wife, your honor, your dog, whatnot, and in the fantasy you duel and you show him. The reality is that a lot of older men, and barely men (very young) lost their lives to men in their prime. Approaching 50 myself I can readily see why dueling isn’t such a grand idea.
oh-la-la.....they can control your AC? Wow.
Thanks for the info....I will make sure to never agree to any smartmeter crapola.
Wait a minute...how do you know if you have one? I don’t get meter readers around anymore. WHere are they located?
Did you say: "let me talk to your supervisor" and then unload on him? If they were calling like that it could well meet the definition of harassment, and if it was upsetting their health there's no reason you couldn't pursue a civil suit for the medical costs.
“And if your “nephew” really exists, he should be fired, before someone blows his ass away for threatening them with lethal force on their own property. “
Buddy of mine worked for a cable company in some ghetto areas and carried concealed despite company policy. His attitude was better to get fired than be dead and no good to his wife/kids.
He’s a VP now in the same company and still carries when he has to go out in the field.
Shouldn't be anything a nice isolation transformer and some capacity storage / peak shaving on the back (load) side shouldn't be able to cure. I realize you shouldn't HAVE to go to all that trouble to keep information you own out of the hands of others, but at least there's a workaround.
I had to pay for every piece of my electrical equipment when I built my house. Every foot of wire from the power company’s pole, the underground conduit, the meter, the ground, the wiring, the entrance boxes, the breakers——which part of that do you think they have an “easement” on?
Dude, it's just a relay contact. They can open and close it remotely all they want, but it only disables your AC if you let it disable your AC.
“oh-la-la.....they can control your AC? Wow.”
I got some blowback from other posters. The point I was trying to make is that the Smart Meter gives the utility the means to remotely control major energy using appliances like A/C units but only if you allow them to install a circuit interrupting device that can be controlled through the smart meter. The more insidious part of Smart Meters is that they can measure your instantaneous usage ( i.e. they can more or less continuously monitor your power usage in real time) which brings into play charging you more for the KWH you use depending on the time of day that you use it. Want to run your washer during the early evening, it will cost you more than if you stay up and do your laundry @ 3 a.m.
If the meter is so poorly designed that it can't even prevent the leakage of personal utility usage information to people with no business having it, I'd hardly call it "smart".
Exactly. How is information YOU OWN leaving your property going to help YOU make better decisions?
Bzzzt! (Thanks for playing!) She just wanted to maintain the status quo ante; she owed them no new money. THEY'RE the ones who wanted to alter the terms of service -- THEY should have offered to pay HER $10 a month to accept the damn thing.
I think Powerage is their best album, even though it didn’t have any radio staples on it...but it’s their most solid effort from start to finish, just balls out rock and roll all the way through.
“Having said that, like most others here, I LOVE HER!!! She will be taking the arrows for millions of us who don’t want a criminal record attached to our names.”
I agree. It’s just time someone stood up to them.
I think this sort of action will be happening more and more in other areas of unnecessary intrusion.
Not good enough. The guy ALWAYS had to come out and read the meter, the cost is already built into today's rates (not to say that it would still be built in five years from now after three more rounds of rate hearings). If they want to save themselves money and just accidentally spy on you, and the only alternative to them spying on you is to reimburse them for the money they would have saved, then let them come up with a meter that can be PROVEN to be incapable of doing nothing more than totalizing usage and reporting one monthly total. THEN it would be OK to force people to take them or pay the meter reader, and not before. The utility is the one that tried to tie the semi-legitimate cost issue to the outrageously ILlegitimate spyware issue, the other party shouldn't be the one to suffer from the linkage of the two. Let the utility expend the cost and effort to separate the two issues and defend them separately.
Speaking of ignorance, if you reread the article you'll see it's not health concerns that motivated her but the (very real) fear of improper leakage of personal electricity usage information that she's concerned about.
They were automated calls. I talked to supervisors at about three different sites. They all kept pointing the fingers at some other department. I finally got it cleared up. *Crosses fingers*
But not the right to push her aside. It is vital to note that she did not reveal the weapon until the installer "kept pushing her out of the way," i.e. physically assaulting her.
If a power company employee manhandles me on my property, I'll ruin his day if I can. And it won't involve a lawyer.
I too am approaching 50, and I too see dueling as not the smartest concept I ever heard of. What I don't get, however, is what delusion led the government to think it was any of their affair to ban or even regulate.
Who? I know for sure the government is one. I suspect that data goes to whomever will also buy it.
It sounds like it varies from community to community but when I built my garage our utility company supplied the primary to the box, along with the meter. Their easement extended across my property to the box for access to their meter.
I hear you, but you’re barking up the wrong tree here. It is MUCH CHEAPER for the utility to have you use power WHEN THEY TELL YOU TO than it is for them to read your meter.
I do realize that meter reading is already built into the cost of service, but the arguments against “Smart Meters” are much more important than a few bucks a month. These things are the second biggest threat to privacy in the past 100 years (the biggest is GPS tracking of cars, that Governor Perry is trying to impose here in Texas).
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