By B.N. Frank
Activist Post has reported about recent legislator and utility bribery scandals in both Ohio and Illinois (see 1, 2, 3, 4). Many don’t realize that utility companies have also benefited at the expense of customers with the deployment of utility “Smart” Meters – electric, gas, and water. These meters DO NOT save meaningful amounts of energy and customer bills tend to go up – not down – after they are installed.
“Smart” Meters collect customer usage data 24/7, whereas original 1-way transmitting analog meters DO NOT. Utilities collect and analyze usage data so they can market more products and services to customers and/or sell data to 3rd parties. Millions have already been installed by American utility companies and millions more are planned. Only time will tell how much “Dark Money” played a role in their deployment as well.
From SP Global:
Ohio bribery scandal increases scrutiny of how utilities use ‘dark money’ groups
As Wall Street analysts and anxious shareholders continue to wait for more dominoes to fall from a federal corruption probe in Ohio, investor-owned utilities could feel greater pressure to avoid any semblance of improper political activity by voluntarily disclosing contributions to “dark money” groups.
“I think there will be efforts to create transparency. I don’t know really what is going to end up happening,” Glenrock Associates LLC analyst Paul Patterson told S&P Global Market Intelligence, expressing skepticism over a “nationwide movement.”
“I think it can vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction,” Patterson said.
David Pomerantz, executive director of the Energy and Policy Institute, a utility watchdog organization, said the Ohio scandal has led to “increased scrutiny on utilities’ use of 501(c)(4) groups to covertly spend money in pursuit of their political agenda, both from policymakers and from investors.”
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“Smart” Meters have been plagued with problems from the start– cybersecurity risks, explosions, fires, frequent replacement, unwanted surveillance (see 1, 2), and more (see 1, 2, 3, 4, 5). A documentary about “Smart” Meters and Grids was released in 2013 and updated in 2017.
Activist Post reports regularly about “Smart” Meters and other unsafe technology. For more information, visit our archives and the following websites:
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