Ashland drops smart meter opt-out fee
EWEB is considering a similar tariff when it rolls out the devices
BY THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: (Tuesday, Jun 12, 2012 06:40PM)Midnight, June 12
ASHLAND — The city of Ashland has dropped plans to charge utility customers who opt out on new smart meters to read their electricity use.
Some residents are afraid that the radio waves transmitted by the smart meters could be harmful to their health.
The City Council has turned down a request from the city-owned Ashland Electric Department to charge customers $120 plus $20 a month to opt out of the new meters, which save money by transmitting the readings so meter readers don’t have to drive down driveways and get out of cars. Instead, it adopted a budget that moved $150,000 from reserves to cover the costs of customers who don’t want smart meters, which so far number about 150.
Ashland resident Pamela Joy said she does not believe smart meters are safe, and chooses not to use wireless Internet, cell phones or a microwave oven. “To choose money over health is insanity. The question of safety needs to be answered first,” Joy said.
The Eugene Water and Electric Board’s plans to move to smart meters is also facing opposition, from an approximately 40-member group called Families for Safe Meters. Members’ concerns range from health issues to vulnerability to cyberattack.
EWEB has responded to the health concerns by pointing out that most of the national and international health organizations that have reviewed thousands of studies have found no evidence that radio frequency signals cause harm to humans.
The Eugene utility, which hopes to begin rolling out its plans in late 2013, also has said it would offer customers an opt-out provision. Earlier this spring EWEB management recommended charging an undetermined opt-out tariff to recover the higher cost of manually reading meters.
In Ashland, city staff members estimate that the cost of reading meters for households that stick with the old-fashioned way is up to $15,000 a year.
Ashland’s finance director, Lee Tuneberg, said he plans to ask for an electric rate increase later this year to cover anticipated increases in the cost of power bought from the Bonneville Power Administration. But now, that request will have to be a little higher to cover the cost of allowing some households to opt out on smart meters.
The Register-Guard contributed to this report.
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