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Every month, meter readers fan out across Kauai, peering at inconspicuously located analog meters with spinning dials on thousands of homes and businesses to record residents’ monthly electricity use.

But Kauai’s electric utility is ushering in a new era of technology starting this month. Meter readers, like milkmen, are expected to soon be a thing of the past. This, in spite of a chorus of concerns from some local residents who warn that new radio transmitting meters will cause health effects as extreme as cancer and usher in an unprecedented era of Orwellian surveillance.

Workers at the Kauai Island Utility Cooperative have installed more than 300 meters on homes and businesses in Kapaa that allow the utility to monitor usage remotely and throughout the day. Within two years, the utility aims to replace all of the old meters with “smart meter” technology designed to help the utility smooth out power on the electric grid and add more renewable energy sources such as solar. It’s also the first step in enabling residents to tell how much it costs them to run their washing machines or air conditioners and their daily, and even hourly, energy usage. Ideally, the knowledge will encourage residents to cut back on how much electricity they use.

Aided by $5.5 million in federal stimulus funds, the Kauai Island Utility Cooperative is one of many electric utilities throughout the country that have received a total of $3.4 billion in stimulus funds doled out by the U.S. Department of Energy. The program, part of President Barack Obama’s energy agenda, is an important component in efforts to shore up the country’s aging, inefficient electric grids and allow the integration of greater amounts of renewable energy sources without causing power outages.

But not everyone on Kauai is embracing the utility’s — or Obama’s — vision for the future. Three hundred residents have already said no to the meters, choosing to stick with the old technology. After being sued, picketed and the target of harsh criticism, KIUC management agreed to allow residents to opt-out of the meters, at least for now.

Hawaiian Electric Co. has also been actively testing smart meters on Maui and Oahu and could be installing them on a larger scale in the future.

On Maui, there are sparks of resistance too. The utility’s smart meter in Maui Meadows prompted local residents to in Kihei to discuss the dangers of the technology.

Opponents main concerns? Health, privacy and in some cases a deep-seated distrust of those in power.

Electromagnetic Sensitivity?

Mark Naea, a retired engineer on Kauai, launched a website called in February to stop the utility’s roll out of the meters.

“Smart meters represent the hubris of the elite, the mindless grasp for more profits, the soulless sacrifice of not only the public’s health and well-being, but ultimately all future generations’ survival,” on the site.

He told Civil Beat that health issues range from nausea, tinnitus, memory loss, inflammation of joints, heart inflammation and cancer.

“The gamut of health issues just alone, should give concern to anyone rolling out smart meters,” he said.

The cluster of symptoms is commonly referred to as “electromagnetic hypersensitivity.” People who claim to have it say they are being harmed by the radiation from wireless devices such as cell phones, WiFi and smart meters.

But a 2011 peer-reviewed conducted by scientists and doctors for the California Council on Science and Technology, found that people who claimed to have the syndrome showed no signs of it during tests comparing them with the general population. The study also concluded that there was no evidence that smart meters posed a health risk.

Radio frequency levels emitted by smart meters are a fraction of that emitted by cell phones, according to the study. And KIUC has worked to reassure residents of the safety of the devices.

“You’re much more likely to come in contact with a cell phone than a smart meter,” said Jim Kelly, a spokesman for the utility. “Mine is on the back of the garage and I don’t usually stand for eight hours with my head pressed up against it.”

But he added that the utility was not dismissing people’s health concerns which is why there’s an opt-out provision.

Protests on Kauai are not isolated. Community groups have organized in states across the country to halt the meters, particularly in California, which is one of the most aggressive in the nation in implementing the technology. Currently the state’s utilities have installed about 5 million smart meters, according to an author of the study conducted for the California Council on Science and Technology, who is dean of engineering and computer science at California State University, Sacramento.

“A lot of public groups have been trying to attack wireless technologies since their inception,” said Macari, who traces the controversy back to the advent of AM radio.

But overall, he says it’s been “a vocal minority.”

“I’ve heard them speak. I’ve heard them mock science,” said Macari. “They are the same people mocked in Kansas for wanting (schools) to have in science books intelligent design.”

Watch What You Grow in Your Closet

Privacy concerns are an entirely different matter. As technology, such as cell phones and the Internet, collect increasing amounts of personal information from users, privacy laws and cybersecurity have been challenged, and smart meters are pushing the envelope even further.

The detailed data collected by the meters can provide a window into what people are doing inside their homes, their eating habits, when they shower and even what type of appliances they are using, according to a recent report by the , a government agency that provides policy and legal analysis to the U.S. Congress. The report notes that 65 million smart meters are expected to be installed throughout the country by 2015.

And while Hawaii’s electric utilities may not have an interest in what type of toaster oven residents own, the breadth of detailed personal data crossing airwaves could be vulnerable to hackers or third-parties.

“Data that reveals which appliances a person is using could permit health insurance companies to determine whether a household uses certain medical devices, and appliance manufacturers to establish whether a warranty has been violated,” according to the report. “Marketers could use it to make targeted advertisements. Criminals could use it to time a burglary and figure out which appliances they would like to steal.”

Smart meters also pose new questions when it comes to privacy laws and whether the data, for better or worse, can be used in criminal investigations.

For example, there are the marijuana growers, who use high amounts of electricity to grow plants in their homes. According to Macari, they have been one of the groups raising alarms about privacy issues in California out of fear that police will be able to locate their operations by monitoring how much power they are using.

The information can also be used in trying to piece together information about missing people or crimes that happen inside the home.

How much of the information can be tapped, and when law enforcement officers can access the data, is expected to be worked out in the court system as judges and lawyers navigate their way through the legal implications of the technology.

While KIUC says that manufacturers are installing security features and encryption technology into their meters, not all Kauai residents are reassured. , a local scientist who has brought a lawsuit against KIUC to halt the roll out, told Civil Beat that the meters were a “flagrant and horrific violation of the U.S. Constitution’s that protects people’s privacy within their homes.

“I don’t think there is some current, giant conspiracy,” said Asquith, “It’s just that many people fought and in some cases died for these rights, and all of us should be vigilant that those are not eroded.”

Asquith said that he was a big supporter of smart grid technology, but that he wanted to see KIUC slow down and do it right.

But for other residents who are vehemently opposed to the smart meters, they may not be able to resist the tide of technological change forever. Technically, KIUC’s opt-out program is a “deferral program,” and there is no assurance that residents will be able to hang on to the old meters forever.

“To me, I liken it to an old-style dial telephone,” said Kelly. “At some point, the technology just moves to the point that it is just not practical to have that anymore. We don’t want to be in the position of no way, no how, never will you have to have a smart meter under any circumstances.”