LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – The Lake County Board of Supervisors may be headed for legal action to stop SmartMeter installations in the county until legislation to give consumers a choice on energy metering is passed.
The Board of Supervisors will hold a discussion at 11 a.m. Tuesday, March 8, to not only discuss a final draft of a letter supporting AB 37, which seeks alternatives to SmartMeters, but also to explore imposing a temporary moratorium or pursuing legal action in order to stop the installations while AB 37 works its way through the state Legislature, as Lake County News has reported.
PG&E spokesperson Brandi Ehlers said the company will have a SmartMeter expert and one of its government representatives at the Tuesday meeting.
AB 37, introduced by Assemblyman Jared Huffman (D-San Rafael) would require the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) to identify alternative metering options for utility customers who don't want the SmartMeters installed at their homes by Jan. 1, 2012.
The bill also requires disclosure to consumers of information about the devices, including timing, magnitude, frequency and duration of radio frequency emissions so that individual consumers can make informed decisions, according to a statement from Huffman.
PG&E began its SmartMeter rollout in Lake County last month. Before year's end, the utility expects to have installed 40,000 SmartMeters in the county, part of the 2.5 million that it expects to have in place by 2012, PG&E reported.
While the supervisors plan to look at all options, Supervisor Anthony Farrington predicted at the March 1 meeting that the CPUC wouldn't be responsive to a locally implemented moratorium.
Farrington appears to have been correct.
In an e-mail exchange with the CPUC late last week, Lake County News asked if the CPUC would honor a moratorium in Lake County if the Board of Supervisors imposed one.
CPUC spokesperson Terrie Prosper responded, “The CPUC does not have plans to impose a moratorium on Smart Meter installations. Smart Meters are being deployed throughout California, nationally, and internationally.”
In a followup discussion with another CPUC spokesman, Andrew Kotch, he confirmed that the agency wouldn't honor a local moratorium.
“The CPUC is the sole authority who can impose a moratorium,” he said, adding, “We have the authority over the utilities, not the local entities.”
PG&E spokesman Jeff Smith told Lake County News, “Ultimately, SmartMeters are going to be installed for all of our customers.”
However, in light of consumer concerns the company is looking at other options, he said.
“We're in the preliminary stages of reviewing that,” Smith said.
Many local customers are creating their own options.
Last week, in what may be the first action of its kind by a tribal government, the Big Valley Tribal Business Committee banned SmartMeters within tribal boundaries, according to the tribe's environmental director, Sarah Ryan.
Over the past week, Lake County News has received messages from readers regarding their concerns about SmartMeters and their actions to stop the installations which PG&E has directed.
Lower Lake resident Fran Ransley said a SmartMeter installer was in her neighborhood on Saturday morning.
Ransley, who had posted a “No SmartMeter” sign on her meter, told the woman she did not want the device, and the contractor was polite, didn't argue and left.
Another reader, Helen Frankenthal, posted on the Lake County Facebook page that a SmartMeter contractor showed up at the fourplex where she lives on Saturday morning, and all four tenants came out and succeeded in getting the man not to install the meter.
She said they were give a three and a half month stay from the installation.
When asked by Lake County News for figures on consumers who are refusing the installations, company representatives responded that they didn't have such numbers available.
CPUC rulings support SmartMeter installations
Kotch pointed to a decision the CPUC issued in December in which it denied the city and county of San Francisco's petition – made last June – to suspend SmartMeter installations in those jurisdictions “until the Commission concludes its investigation into the significant problems created by PG&E's deployment of its SmartMeters.”
The city and county also has petitioned for expedited treatment of the petition, which was denied last September by an administrative law judge who said, “the information available at this time indicates that the costs associated with a suspension of PG&E’s Smart Meter installation program, in both monetary and human terms, appear to be substantial and exceed the doubtful benefits of an immediate
suspension.”
The CPUC's December findings stated, “There are no facts that show that the SmartMeters are less accurate than current meters or that the billing system is now generating fewer accurate bills.”
The agency dismissed concerns raised about electromagnetic fields, which it said had been settled in a previous ruling.
The 22-page decision also referenced PG&E's general rate case, filed last October, that seeks SmartMeter cost recovery and benefit recognition through consumer rate hikes during the period from 2011 to 2013. That rate case is supposed to provide for an independent audit overseen by CPUC staff of SmartMeter costs.
The commission decision mentions a report conducted by an independent consultant, the Structure Group, on the SmartMeter program. The report included evaluation of 750 Smart Meters and 147 electromechanical meters as well as review of 1,378 electric SmartMeter complaints.
In its arguments against the San Francisco petition PG&E said the Structure report “expressly refutes the allegations of flawed technology” that formed the basis of the petition.
However, the CPUC's Division of Ratepayer Advocates (DRA) asked for a full investigation of the Structure report, objecting to several of the report's findings regarding SmartMeter software and billing systems being consistent with industry standards, as well as findings that the meters perform accurately.
In documents relating to the petition DRA also stated that it has continued its preliminary review of the Structure report “and in doing so has discovered other anomalies and limitations.”
In responding to Lake County News' questions about a local moratorium, Prosper sent a fact sheet titled, “The Benefits of Smart Meters,” which explains how the CPUC “has authorized the state’s investor owned utilities to replace conventional customer meters with Smart Meters in order to give consumers greater control over their energy use.”
The fact sheet includes similar statements to those PG&E officials have made regarding the devices.
CPUC's document states that SmartMeters will give customers “greater control over their electricity use when coupled with time-based rates,” reduce peak energy demand, provide for faster outage detections, offer online information access for customers and alerts about energy consumption, benefit the environment and aid in creating a “smart grid,” meant to better manage energy demand.
The CPUC fact sheet also quotes an Edison Foundation that states more than 8 million SmartMeters have been deployed by electric utilities in the U.S. and nearly 60 million should be in place by 2020.
The CPUC said it authorized PG&E to install approximately 5 million electric meters and 4.2 million natural gas meters. In addition, it has cleared Southern California Edison to install approximately 5.3 million new SmartMeters, and San Diego Gas and Electric Co. 1.4 million electric SmartMeters and 900,000 natural gas meters.
PG&E didn't communicate program well
Smith said that the Structure report faulted PG&E for not doing a good job of communicating with customers about the SmartMeter program.
He said the company treated the SmartMeter installations on peoples' homes much like the replacement of another piece of infrastructure, “and that was certainly, in retrospect, a mistake,” he said.
“We didn’t realize this was something that was going to be much more personal to our customers,” Smith said.
Now, before they go into an area, PG&E tries to give as much information as possible to customers, Smith said. When they hear of people who don't want the devices, they try to engage them.
If people refuse the meters, PG&E will continue to work with them to understand the program, said Smith.
“That's really what we are continuing to do in situations like that,” he said.
E-mail Elizabeth Larson at
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