Signalfire

September 9th

An email obtained by City Paper suggests collaboration between the state Department of Homeland Security and gas drilling interests.

The email, authored by Pennsylvania Homeland Security cheif James Powers, was written in apparent error: addressed to one Virginia Coady, a well-known participant in anti-drilling forums, the letter indicates that Powers mistakenly mistook Ms. Coady for someone associated with pro-drilling interests.

In the email (full text below), Powers warns Coady against distributing information gathered by the Pa. DHS on anti-drilling activities, telling Coady that: “We want to continue providing this support to the Marcellus Shale Formation natural gas stakeholders while not feeding those groups fomenting dissent against those same companies.”

The “support” he speaks of consists at least partly of confidential updates on anti-drilling activists and activties. A report yesterday evening by nonprofit investigative journalism outfit Pro Publica broke the news that the Pennsylvania Dept. of Homeland Security included in its regular newsletter, the Pennsylvania Intelligence Bulletin, decriptions of various activities and gatherings of activists opposed to gas drilling in the Marcellus Shale.

Included in a list entitled “Dates of interest” are a series of local meetings about gas drilling issues – a drilling ordinance in Cranberry County, a hearing in Damascus, Pa. on zoning regulations – as well as the recent screening in Philadelphia of the “controversial Gasland movie,” – a documentary by filmmaker Josh Fox on the dangers of hydraulic fracturing, the process used to extract natural gas from the Marcellus Shale.

City Paper emailed Mr. Powers to confirm authenticity of the email and was contacted instead by Governor Rendell’s chief spokesman Gary Tuma, who acknowledged that the email was authentic and said that the Pa. Dept. of Homeland Security was sharing such information with certain local interests – including gas drilling companies – because of “recent acts of vandalism” against drilling operations.

“There have been five acts of vandalism against Marcellus Shale drilling facilities,” in the last two weeks, he said, “including two of which involved firearms … shotguns fired at equipment.”

A third incident involved theft, he said after being asked for details, and the other two were “minor incidents.”

Tuma added that “There have been peaceful protests related to MS drilling by people who oppose drilling and the increased amoutn of driling – certainly no one is trying to restrict the rights of peaceful protest conducted within the parameters fo the first amendment.”

Asked whether there have been any protests that were not peaceful, Mr. Tuma acknowledged, “There have not been any that I’m aware of.”
[ email follows]
Miss Virginia,
For Your Information & Situational Awareness
Just a short note of clarification regarding the intent of the PIB. The information provided to you via
the PIB is not for dissemination in the public domain. As indicated in the caveats on the first page, the
PIB is solely meant for owners/operators & security personnel associated with our critical
infrastructure & key resources.
Although an internet forum is certainly a great way to spread the word and receive input from forum
participants, it’s still in the public domain and thus be accessed by both pro and anti-natural gas drilling
folks.
Please assist us in keeping the information provided in the PIB to those having a valid need-to-know; it
should only be disseminated via closed communications systems.
Thanks for your support. We want to continue providing this support to the Marcellus Shale Formation
natural gas stakeholders while not feeding those groups fomenting dissent against those same
companies.
Jim

ADEN, Yemen — Thousands of people set car tyres ablaze and vandalised property in several areas of the southern Yemen city of Aden on Monday in protest at a power cut, an AFP journalist and local officials said.

Residents of impoverished south Yemen face daily power cuts, and every day a different district in the Aden region loses an hour of electricity a day.

But as temperatures soared to around 40 degrees Celsius (101 Fahrenheit) on Monday evening, Aden’s eight districts were all plunged into darkness at the same time.

This triggered widespread protests, with violence reported in Aden and gunfire heard in the districts of Khor Maksar, Al-Mansura, Sheikh Osman and Dar Saed, the sources said.

In Khor Maksar “protesters broke into Muftah Aden hotel and smashed its front glass door,” hotel owner Mansur al-Sharabi told AFP by telephone.

Hundreds of protesters also set tyres alight in Al-Mualla and Crater, local officials and witnesses said.

When police tried to disperse the crowds, they were peppered with stones, the sources added. There were no immediate reports of casualties.

“The people of the south are already tense and the power cuts only added to the tension, triggering protests,” a leader of the separatist Southern Movement, Yahya Ghaleb al-Shuaybi, told AFP by telephone.

South Yemen, where residents complain of discrimination by the Sanaa government in the allocation of resources, is frequently the scene of unrest.

The south was independent from 1967 until 1990 when it united with the north. It launched an abortive secession bid in 1994 and is still home to an active secessionist movement.

Yemen, the Arab world’s poorest country and the ancestral homeland of Osama bin Laden, has also been struggling to combat an Al-Qaeda resurgence as well as Shiite unrest in the north.

5 September

Over a thousand Senegalese demonstrators took to the streets of Zinguinchor on Saturday to protest against recurrent power cuts. The government had promised to resume power supplies on August 15, following weeks of power failures throughout the country.

Ziguinchor is the main city in Casamance province, 464  km South of the capital Dakar.  Organisers say there were 1,500 demonstrators, while police estimated their number at 1,000. People from all ages marched through the city, holding candles or lamps to express their discontent at the shortages.

On one of the posters targeting the state-owned electricity company Senelec,  one could read: “We pay our bills, give us 24/24 hours electricity”.

Local governor Cheikh Tidiane Dieng, who spoke with demonstrators, said their march, which had been authorised, had  \been held with ” respect  and public-spiritedness “, unlike the spontaneous demonstrations that erupted in recent  days. Local media say demonstrators had  ” besieged ” Senelec offices in Zinguinchor, burning tires and blocking roads.

Ramadan

The power cuts continue as Senegal, a mainly muslim country, prepares for religious festivities next week. Taylors in Zuiguinchor complain that they cannot fill special orders for the celebrations.

The government had promised to resume power supplies on August 15, following weeks of power failures throughout the country.

On August 14, thousands marched in Dakar to protest against electricity shortages, floods and rising  food costs.

The annual power cuts come at the same time as flash downpours brought on by the rainy season, causing flooding in the suburbs and raising ire among communities.

August 26

At his inauguration at the pre-Inca ruins of Tiwanaku five years ago, Evo Morales donned a poncho, it was a moment of high symbolism: Bolivia’s first president of Indian descent has championed their rights ever since.

Five landslide elections have made Mr Morales, a leftwing former llama herder and coca farmer, one of Latin America’s most popular leaders and left the opposition fragmented.

Mr Morales and his Movement Towards Socialism (MAS) have a comfortable majority in Congress, enjoy the loyalty of the military and hold sway over the judiciary. The government expects 4.5 per cent gross domestic product growth this year.

But divisions among his traditional Indian supporters are surfacing. In the mining region of Potosi, traditionally one of Mr Morales’ bastions, residents, miners and peasants have been on strike and engaged in anti-government protests since late July.

They are demanding greater investment in their region and want a solution to a boundary dispute with neighbouring Oruro. In one of Latin America’s key mining areas, these protests and blockades have ground mining production to a halt.

That disenchantment is increasingly visible around Bolivia. “Evo traitor” reads graffiti near the presidential palace, in La Paz.

“Evo has betrayed some large sectors of the indigenous population”, says Pedro Nuni, a disenchanted MAS congressman. “He and many others in the government love the label ‘indigenous government’, but the reality is that he is turning his back on some of the indigenous brothers – especially us lowlanders – on behalf of indigenous highlanders”, says Mr Nuni, whose lowland seat in gas-rich Santa Cruz lies in what was traditionally the heartland of the rightwing opposition.

“The situation is complicated,” says Senator Eugenio Rojas, one of Mr Morales’ closest allies. For the first time we the peasants, the indigenous, have the right to run this country. But now we are seeing problems between indigenous people over power, territories and ancient disputes,” he acknowledges. “This is provoking some clashes inside the MAS structure.”

Divisions within the MAS between leftist, indigenous, union and civic groups are growing, says Carlos Toranzo, a political economist with the Latin American Institute of Social Research. “They all fight for control of government spending and opportunities for patronage. These are classic power fights inside the structure of all-powerful political apparatuses that are based on clientelism.”

One problem is that Mr Morales has raised expectations in terms of the decentralisation of power, indigenous rights and land rights. Recent protests and strikes by Indians and trade unionists expose the government’s vulnerability to unrest from previously stalwart supporters. “Everybody seems to be taking advantage of the dissatisfaction with inefficiencies, corruption and MAS intimidation,” Mr Toranzo adds.

Part of the anger felt by some indigenous lowlanders is due to what some call “Evo’s oil lust” as the government explores for resources in protected areas of the Amazon.

“Evo’s environmentalist and industrialist rhetorical facade that helped secure a second term has fallen away. Everything shows that this is a government desperate to get money and is returning the country to what it said it was against: a model of pure extraction of natural resources at any cost,” says Mr Toranzo.

The energy sector needs investment urgently and fluctuations in the volumes and price of gas exports, Bolivia’s main source of revenue, have had an impact on the economy.

Some even fear Bolivia may lose a share of its main market for gas exports, neighbouring Brazil, if José Serra wins October’s presidential election. The centre-right candidate is likely to cool ties with some of President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s leftwing allies, among them Mr Morales.

Bolivia’s finance minister, Luis Arce, forecasts 4.5 per cent growth for Bolivia and a $1bn trade surplus by the end of the year. “We are advancing and delivering results into the hands of the people,” he said. “The change is now irreversible.”

August 26, 2010
Government makes empty promises, represses demonstrations

On Aug. 18, over 200 Egyptians blocked a major highway in Fayoum, southern Cairo, with burning tires and barricades to protest daily power outages. The blackouts began in early August at the start of Ramadan, the holy month for Muslims, when temperatures in Egypt can climb to 100 degrees F and above. The blackouts are especially punishing for Muslim Egyptians without air conditioning during this time of religious observance, which includes doing without water during the daily fast.

Power outages and water shortages are now frequent occurrences throughout the country.

The lack of electricity for 15 days in the village of Bassioun led the residents to file complaints with the electricity minister and the governor of Gharbyia. The residents also threatened to protest in front of the governorate headquarters if the power outage continued.

The lack of cooperation of the government and local authorities to provide such basic supplies as electricity and water provoked the protest. The working people and poor of Egypt have also had to put up with shortages of cooking gas and bread, and monetary inflation. In addition, the two-week blackout has spoiled stored food, greatly impacted bakeries and restaurants, ruined electric equipment and led to increased road accidents. The Mubarak government promised to provide more electricity utilizing the Aswan Dam’s hydroelectric plant. Pres. Mubarak also met with the oil and electricity ministers to discuss the outages.

Meanwhile, protesters have been met by police repression and dispersed. The government has also claimed that it is the people and not the government that is to blame for the shortages of water and electricity.. Government rhetoric has gone so far as to accuse shop owners of wasting electricity by lighting Ramadan decorations and to demand they be unplugged. Commentator Osama Heikal, who writes for Al- Masry El Youm, observed that the government is blaming the people for its own failure to communicate and provide for the people.

The Egyptian government, an ally of the United States and second biggest recipient of U.S. aid after Israel, having adopted neo-liberal economic policies, has failed miserably to meet the needs of the Egyptian people, such as education, jobs, housing, health care and basic necessities. The renewal for an additional two years of the 28-year emergency law that allows the government to arrest activists, opposition leaders and journalists without due process, has also provoked great anger among the Egyptian people.

By Angelique Carson

Smart grids are the future of power, but what does that mean for the future of privacy?

The transmission networks spanning nations to provide light, heat and electricity will soon undergo a radical transformation. Most of the world’s developed countries have invested in or plan to invest huge sums to implement smart energy infrastructures within the next two decades. The “smart grid” will revolutionize the way utilities and consumers measure and monitor electricity usage. It is expected to save money and aid energy conservation. But the grid will also result in massive amounts of new data, data that can reveal intimate details about households and the people who live in them. The risk of exposure or misuse of such data creates a new set of concerns for consumers and privacy professionals.

The smart grid will rely on “smart” meters, which will record household energy consumption and communicate it back to power providers. These new smart meters will replace the electromechanical meters that are attached to most households across the world today.

Smart appliances, which are being developed and sold by some of the world’s largest manufacturers, will enhance the intelligent grid, feeding smart meters with real-time information about electrical use down to the appliance level-smoothie at seven, treadmill at eight, for example. (According to a recent Zpryme report, the global market for household smart appliances is projected to reach $15.12 billion in 2015.) This precision will allow utility companies to analyze peak power usage times and set electric rates accordingly. In turn, households will gain a tool for more efficient management of their energy consumption, which they could use to lower costs and conserve energy. For example, customers will have the ability to time their laundry chores for off-peak energy hours.

When the grid, the meter, and the appliances are implemented and integrated, consumers will be able to fine-tune their energy consumption to get the best rates and utilities will be able to more effectively manage power distribution and identify and resolve problems remotely.

The savings potential is expected to be massive. The grid is also expected to help power suppliers prevent blackouts and brownouts by allowing for power distribution to be delivered more evenly and on a need-based schedule.

Nations and utilities are investing in the development of the smart grid, and many companies have already deployed smart meters. But while those involved throw millions, even billions, toward the grid, cautioning voices are calling for privacy protections.

“We are talking about implementing a very new type of network…a network that people are always attached to,” says Rebecca Herold, CIPP, founder of Rebecca Herold and Associates, LLC. Herold has led the U.S. National Institute for Standards and Technology (NIST) Smart Grid privacy subgroup since June 2009 and co-authored the NIST report on smart grid privacy, which is under review by NIST and expected to be published soon.

The information collected on a smart grid will form a library of personal information, the mishandling of which could be highly invasive of consumer privacy,” said Christopher Wolf, co-author with Jules Polonetsky of a whitepaper published by the Future of Privacy Forum and the Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner of Ontario. “There will be major concerns if consumer-focused principles of transparency and control are not treated as essential design principles, from beginning to end.”

Utilities are aware of the privacy concerns, according to Rick Thompson, the president of Greentech Media (GTM), which publishes market research on smart grids. “It’s absolutely on their radar,” he says, adding, “That doesn’t mean they have a full understanding or solution to solve that problem, but I think it’s an area that they are investigating heavily.”

It’s an area worthy of investigation, according to many. Some say the smart grid will be “bigger than the Internet,” which will result in an exponential increase of coveted, valuable and potentially identifiable data.

“You come into new types of privacy issues because you are now revealing personal activities in ways that are not historically, or have not been considered to date as being personally identifiable information,” Herold says.

Beyond knowing how often the refrigerator opens or what time the garage door activates each morning, grid data may be a way of discerning when a household is empty or full, when family members go to bed at night or what time the kids come home from school.  Marketers might want to tap into the data to find out when a household might be due for a new refrigerator or washing machine. Law enforcement might be interested in corroborating a story. An insurance company might want to know if a homeowner’s alarm was turned on when a burglary occurred.  A divorce attorney might want to subpoena energy-use records to aid a case.

Who owns the data?

In a recent newspaper article, Simon McKenzie, the chief executive of a New Zealand electricity supplier, said in that country, where hundreds of thousands of smart meters are currently being installed, “…we’re starting to see the retailers and network companies say: ‘Hey, there’s a number of different ways that we haven’t even considered that we could utilize this data…to provide better service or solutions to customers.” The full potential of smart grids has yet to be realized, McKenzie told The New Zealand Herald.

But should retailers and other entities have access to the data? That is a question being examined on a global scale.

In response to the McKenzie’s comments, New Zealand Privacy Commissioner Marie Shroff said that companies need to be transparent about what information is being tracked and collected. “People need to be able to make fully informed decisions before agreeing to the new technology,” Shroff said.

Others call for limited use of data gleaned from smart grids.

“The risk with a rich new data source is the temptation to use the information for more than originally intended,” Australian Privacy Commissioner Karen Curtis told those attending a smart infrastructure conference earlier this year.

That’s why it will be crucial to answer the question of who owns and has access to consumers’ energy usage data, which could reveal existing and emerging types of personally identifable information, Herold says.

It’s a familiar question for privacy pros, who have grappled with it in other areas of practice, but perhaps less familiar for utilities. In a recent study, GTM asked utility companies who owns the granular data collected by smart meters-the utility company, the consumer, or a third party. The results showed a decided lack of consensus.

“The interesting thing is that it was pretty well split evenly between those three options,” said GTM’s Thompson. Of the companies surveyed, 39 percent said the data belonged to the consumer, 29 percent said the utility, itself, owned it, and 32 percent were unsure.

[Chart from Greentech Media's 2010 North American Utility Smart Grid Deployment Survey]

The president of an advocacy group for the smart grid industry is more decided on the topic. “The consumer should always have access to that data,” says Kathleen Hamilton, president of the GridWise Alliance, which counts more than 100 companies and organizations as members. “I think the consumer is going to be the owner of that data,” Hamilton said. “But I think what consumers don’t understand is that when they give their data to others, if there aren’t privacy provisions in place, they can use the data in ways that either the consumer may not agree with or think is appropriate.”

That’s a worry many can relate to and a debate that must play itself out soon, as 70 percent of North American utility companies polled for the aforementioned GTM survey indicated that smart grid projects were either a “strong” or “highest” business priority between now and 2015. Governments keen to the potential have invested heavily in smart grid infrastructures. In the U.S., President Obama allocated $3.4 billion in national stimulus monies to utility companies last year to incent development of smart grid technologies. The European Parliament’s passage of the 3rd Energy Package last year will outfit 80 percent of EU electricity customers with smart meters by 2020. In Sweden, smart meters are now mandated by the government. The UK, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, parts of Asia, Denmark, and the Netherlands have all reported plans to build intelligent grids. And the Chinese government has allocated $7.3 billion to grid projects in 2010.

It is clear that the potential privacy pitfalls loom large. Less clear is the best solution to prevent them.

“I think there are still a lot of questions out there about what the correct solution might be,” says GTM’s Thompson, predicting that solutions will vary based on the regulations of various regions.

Like other areas of data privacy, regulation is a word that could divide the debate in the months and years to come.

Some predict smart grid privacy issues to be bigger in Europe than other places due to the strength of the bloc’s Data Protection Directive.

So far in the U.S., regulation has focused primarily on securing the grid infrastructure from cyber attack. For example, the Grid Reliability and Infrastructure Defense (GRID) Act, introduced in April, charges the FERC with safeguarding the transmission grid from cyber threats. The bill also tasks FERC with enforcing privacy measures, stating “the commission shall protect from disclosure only the minimum amount of information necessary to protect the reliability of the bulk power system and defense critical electric infrastructure.” The House passed the bill in June but the Senate has yet to vote.

Other bills focus on ensuring consumers have access to the data their homes’ meters produce.  In March, Rep. Edward Markey (D-MA), chairman of the House Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming, introduced The Electric Consumer Right to Know Act (e-KNOW), legislation to ensure consumers have access to free, timely and secure data about their energy usage. It also calls for the FERC to develop national standards for consumer energy data accessibility, to help utilities and state regulatory agencies formulate their policies, according to Markey’s Web site.

State lawmakers have begun drafting their own legislation. In Colorado, a state where smart meter implementation is already widespread, Senate Bill 10-180 calls for the creation of a task force to recommend measures to “encourage the orderly implementation of smart grid technology” in that state. The bill says that one of the issues the task force must determine is the potential impacts on consumer protection and privacy.

A call for standards

Privacy experts say the lack of legal protection surrounding the smart grid is concerning. They are calling for standards.

“In the absence of clear rules, this potentially beneficial smart grid technology could mean yet another intrusion on private life,” Jim Dempsey of the Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT) said in a March filing to the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC), which held a three-day hearing that month to explore smart grid policies.

“The PUC should act now, before our privacy is eroded,” Dempsey wrote.

The CDT teamed with the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) on the filing, urging the CPUC to adopt “comprehensive privacy standards for the collection, retention, use and disclosure of the data” gleaned from the smart grid.

The National Institute of Standards and Technology smart grid privacy subgroup, which Herold leads, has released two drafts of the privacy chapter “Smart Grid Cyber Security Strategy and Requirements.” The document includes a privacy impact assessment and addresses possible risks the smart grid presents-including cyber attacks, data breaches and the vulnerability of interconnected networks’ increased exposure to potential hackers.

The draft says that while most states have laws in place regarding privacy protection, those laws do not necessarily relate to the types of data that will be within the smart grid, and many existing laws are specific to industries other than utilities. The group recommends that provisions be included within privacy laws to protect the consumer data held by utility companies. The final NISTIR 7628 Version 1 is expected soon, after which it will be submitted to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC).

Minimize, destroy, build privacy in

As with other privacy debates, those pushing for smart infrastructure privacy protections espouse mantras often heard in data protection circles-data minimization, data destruction and privacy by design.

Utilities should minimize the amount of household data collected and should keep it for the shortest amount of time possible, advocates say, in order to minimize the risk associated with storing such data.

Ontario Privacy Commissioner Ann Cavoukian agrees. In her whitepaper, she also cautions that privacy concerns must be considered early in the planning stages in order to mitigate the risks surrounding the revealing data meters collect.

By designing privacy into the grid, “we can have both privacy and a fully functioning smart grid,” Cavoukian wrote in a Toronto Star Op-Ed.

The government of Ontario has committed to the installation of smart meters in every home and business by the end of 2010 and Cavoukian has partnered with major utilities to develop “gold standards” for building privacy into grid projects.

Some privacy advocates point to Ontario’s Hydro One as a utility company setting the standard for baking privacy provisions into its policy before deploying smart meters. Rick Stevens, director of distribution development at Hydro One says the protection of consumer’s information was built into smart meters’ designs based on Ontario’s privacy regulations.

“The regulations certainly set the context for the project,” Stevens said. “We’re just really ensuring that we bake those protections into the product that we put out there. Given that this is new technology, we’re going to be very careful to protect consumer interest as we roll these out. I know we, as an industry, take it very seriously.”

Hydro One has 1.1 million meters already deployed, and at least 700,000 of them are currently reporting data back to the utility on an hourly basis. Stevens says that, as a rule, the utility does not sell customers’ data to third parties and would only share data after obtaining written authorization customers.

The president of LinkGard Systems, an Armenian software maker, says his company’s Energy Management System, which is currently being tested in the U.S., was built with privacy in mind. “It is our strong belief that the utility company has no need to control individual appliances in a residence or a commercial location,” said Hovanes Manucharyan. “The same effect can be achieved by using solutions that don’t require the customer to expose their private energy usage information…We feel that this model is friendlier towards privacy since the utility doesn’t need to acquire, store and manage potentially private data from a customer.”

Hovanes said the stronger regulatory framework of the EU could result in slightly different implementations of smart grid technologies in that market.

Beyond PII

We haven’t yet heard a debate on whether our garage door-opening habits qualify as personal data, but it’s a question that privacy experts say should be answered.

“People have to realize it’s a new type of network,” says Herold. “It’s ‘always on,’ passively collecting information about people in their homes. It’s more than just PII, it’s personal activities,” she adds.

This is what concerns a California man who staged a dramatic protest recently when Pacific Gas & Electric attempted to install a smart meter at his home. Calling it an “unconstitutional invasion of his privacy” he locked his existing meter, saying, “PG&E needs to be stopped in their tracks here.”

Education needed

But smart meters are being rolled out in many places and typically without protest. Indeed, though smart grids are certainly on the radar of utilities and governments, most consumers are in the dark. According to a recent Harris Interactive poll, 68 percent have never heard of the smart grid and 63 percent “draw a blank” about smart meters. Experts say that will change.

“You are going to see a lot more awareness over the next 24 months,” says Greentech Media’s Rick Thompson, “but in terms of becoming a true household name, I’d say that’s still three to five years out.” Thompson says utility companies are just starting to understand the importance of launching educational campaigns aimed at consumer awareness.

A newly formed coalition of companies and organizations-the nonprofit Smart Grid Consumer Collaborative-hopes to increase consumer awareness in the area. “The grid is not really smart unless the consumers are able to be active participants,” said Katherine Hamilton of the GridWise Alliance, one of the founding members of SGCC.

Hydro One’s Stevens says building consumer awareness by communicating the cost-savings potential and environmental benefits is what helped make his company’s transition to smart meters successful in Ontario.

“For the most part it’s been positive,” Stevens said. “I think the reason for that is the type of information we’ve been able to provide to customers.”

Stevens said, however, given his company’s success with smart meters, that the only reason to have increasing regulations in the future would be if issues arise that require them.

When asked whether utility companies’ self-regulatory efforts will be sufficient to stave off regulations, Herold said it’s important to consider just how many different players will be involved in the smart grid, including non-energy sector companies creating applications and appliances.

“Self-regulation is a good goal, but when you start looking realistically, how do you ensure entities consistently provide protections throughout the entire smart grid if you don’t establish requirements they must all follow?” Herold asks.

She points to the healthcare and financial industries as evidence that regulations are often necessary.

“It’s always important, in dealing with privacy, to not only take what we know from past experiences, but also have our minds open to possible impacts going forward.”

Some say that having the right people on board will help companies avoid issues. “One of the key things utilities should be doing today is training and hiring privacy professionals,” says Future of Privacy Forum Director Jules Polonetsky, CIPP. “Data enables the grid, but could also be its Achilles heel, if companies don’t have the experts in place to help shape decisions as the grid is being built.”

Stevens agrees, saying that it’s in the utility industry’s best interest to maintain consumer privacy protections moving forward.

“It’s a necessity,” he says. “Otherwise, it’ll backfire on us.”

This article was originally published in the July 2010 edition of the International Association of Privacy Professionals’ member newsletter, The Privacy Advisor, and is reprinted here with permission.

http://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/smart-grids-and-the-future-of-privacy

India clamps down on Maoists to woo mining investors
3 Aug 2010
NEW DELHI: India’s growing Maoist violence is worrying investors, forcing authorities to fight back aggressively in hopes of luring up to $7 billion in funds needed to boost coal and iron ore output vital for growth.

Maoist violence killed 426 people in the period from January to July, up nearly three times from a year ago, the South Asia Terrorism Portal shows, spotlighting the danger of mining in India’s mineral-rich eastern and central states and the challenge to the country’s ability to maintain law and order.

The Maoist rebels say they are fighting for the rights of India’s poor and disenfranchised, and find support among millions of tribal and lower caste people who accuse the state and big firms of neglect and exploitation in regions rich in minerals.

“If this issue is resolved, first of all logistics will improve significantly because trying to transport material has become a big problem,” said Prasad Baji, senior vice-president at Edelweiss Securities in Mumbai, the financial capital.

“Mining operations and production will also improve.” Analysts say India must attract $7 billion in funds by 2013 to develop an additional 100 million tonnes of coal and 50 million tonnes of iron ore to meet estimated demand and maintain economic growth of more than 6 percent over the last two years.

India has reserves of 267 billion tonnes of coal and about 25 billion tonnes of iron ore.

But investors can only be won over by a concerted effort to crush the Maoist threat and speed reform, the government’s twin aims in overhauling a law more than 50 years old that regulates the mining industry.

The changes would affect domestic metal and mining firms such as Sesa Goa, Sterlite Industries, Tata Steel and the Steel Authority of India, and global giants Rio Tinto and BHP Billiton

STAKES OF 26 PCT FOR LOCALS

Several federal ministries are weighing the new bill’s proposals for companies to share more than a quarter of their profit or equity with locals, for foreign investor participation in joint ventures and wide federal powers to tackle lawlessness.

The legal overhaul is part of government moves to expand social programmes for the poor, simultaneously pleasing its core supporters among voters, blocking flows of new recruits to the Maoists and balancing modern lifestyles against traditional ways.

Several government panels will debate the bill, revising it, and perhaps watering down the 26 percent profit-sharing figure, before it goes to parliament early next year prior to becoming law, analysts say.

Containing the Maoists, who were spawned by a peasant revolt in eastern India in 1967, is one of the biggest challenges the government faces and there is no guarantee fresh investments in mining will pay off, many analysts and industry figures agree.

“The eradication of Maoists may take at least two years,” said Edelweiss’s Baji, adding that the well-armed groups were entrenched in forested and hilly terrain, enjoyed the support of locals, and had gained strength over many years.

India’s security forces fanned out against the rebels in March in their biggest deployment in post-independence history, but the army is not being used for fear of alienating locals, leaving ill-trained police forces to fight a guerrilla war.

The government also plans to set up a unified command to coordinate the security offensive against the Maoists and spend more than 9.5 billion rupees to build roads and bridges in strife-torn areas.

SLOW PROJECTS

But the payoff for the government could be a while in coming.

“Who will go to these areas to work? There is no development, no law and order,” said S. B. S. Chauhan, an advisor at the Federation of Indian Mineral Industries (FIMI) in New Delhi, which groups 400 metal and mining firms.

Slow development of new mines could see India’s coal imports swell nearly 47 percent over the next two years and iron ore supplies fall short of big steel capacities on the drawing board.

India imported about 68 million tones of coal in the year to March 2010, on top of output of 531 million tonnes. Analysts expect coal imports to exceed 100 million by March 2012.

Iron ore production of 226 million tonnes in the year to March 2010 sufficed for domestic use and exports, but more high-grade ores are needed for major steel capacity growth, to the tune of 120 million tonnes, by March 2012.

Annual output at India’s largest iron ore miner, NMDC Ltd fell nearly 16 percent in the year to March 2010 after Maoists cut a slurry pipeline in India’s central state of Chhattisgarh, the worst hit by the revolt.

Market sources said pipeline owner Essar Steel had decided not to repair the link between its plants and NMDC’s mines until the surrounding area was made safe.

NMDC chairman Rana Som said the company planned to build its own slurry pipeline traversing safer areas.

A. K. Sarkar, marketing director of Coal India, said strikes cost 80 days during the year to March 2009 in subsidiary Central Coalfields Ltd, several of them attributable to disruption by the Maoists.

“If the law and order situation is improved, coal production can rise by at least 25 percent,” Coal Minister Sriprakash Jaiswal said in June.

Delays suffered by domestic firms Tata Steel and Essar Steel and leading global steelmakers POSCO and Arcelor Mittal show how tough it is to complete projects in the central and eastern regions, analysts say.

Securing mining leases and negotiating farmers’ protests against land buys have caused POSCO and Arcelor Mittal delays of more than two years in building a total of 37 million tonnes of capacity in eastern India.

“People are scared to come here,” said Ashok Surana, president of the Chhattisgarh Mini Steel Plant Association in Raipur, which has 135 members.

“Such big projects are planned, but the local businessmen don’t know if they can invest in building new hotels because of the Maoists.”

Maoist strike hits road, rail services
August 03, 2010
Road and rail services were badly affected in Jharkhand due to a 48-hour strike called by Maoists that began on Tuesday, officials said. The national highways wore a deserted look and no long-route buses plied in many parts of the state. Life came to standstill in many districts like Gumla,
Latehar, Khuti, Chatra, Palamau and Giridih, among others.

As a precautionary measure, railway authorities cancelled five train services and diverted the routes of six others. Trucks were stranded at many places due to the strike and buses didn’t ply either in many areas.

“We stopped the movement of buses as a precautionary step. There are recent examples of Maoists attacking passengers travelling in buses during a strike period,” said Ramdev Yadav, a travel agent at a Ranchi bus stand.

The pro-Maoist Peoples’ Committee Against Police Atrocities (PCAPA) and its militant wing have called for the 48-hour shutdown in five states, including Jharkhand, to mourn the recent killing of their supreme commander Sidhu Soren in a shootout in West Bengal.

India offers Maoist rebels cash for weapons

August 02. 2010

NEW DELHI // In an attempt to tackle growing Maoist violence, two state governments revealed details yesterday of a weapons-buyback and job-traing program that offers rebels substantial money for their surrender and weapons.

For example, the plan provides a one-time payment of 150,000 rupees (Dh11,920), a monthly stipend of 2,000 rupees for three years and additional future payments to rebels who surrender their bullets, guns, missiles and explosives. They also will receive training as special police officers.

Under the plan, 25,000 rupees is offered for a surrendered machine gun, sniper rifle or rocket-propelled grenade. A surface-to-air missile would fetch an extra 20,000 rupees, an AK-series assault rifle 15,000 rupees, a landmine, improvised explosive device or pistol revolver 3,000 rupees and each kilogram of explosive 1,000 rupees, a West Bengal police statement said.

Zulfiquar Hassan, inspector general of Maoist-infested western range of West Bengal, said that the surrendered guerrillas would be placed in a special camp and provided extra security, so they are not targeted by fellow rebels who might want to punish them.

“We can train and employ the surrendered rebels as [short-term] special police officers. We can also arrange permanent government jobs for some if their performance is that satisfying. We shall also give them vocational training which can help them secure jobs in future… we are even open to negotiations with more attractive offers if some rebels really want to surrender, but do not find our package interesting.”

Manoj Verma, police chief of Maoist-infested West Midnapur district in West Bengal, said that as the Maoists are losing their support in many villages it was the “right time” to introduce the scheme.

Mr Verma said the goverment has received feelers from at least 10 Maoist cadres who are willing to surrender since a broad outline of the plan was revealed last week. “We believe some more rebels will be ready to return to normal life after they know the details of our scheme for surrender on offer,” he said.

“Many Maoists cadres are hiding in forests and remote villages. To distribute our leaflets which are carrying the details of our scheme in different languages, we may use helicopter.”

Neyaz Ahmed, police chief of Maoist-troubled neighbouring Jharkhand state, said yesterday that two Maoists, impressed with the government-offered rehabilitation package, had surrendered.

Rajdeo Yadav, a Maoist commander who surrendered in Jharkhand, told police that he left his group because he did not agree with the Maoists’ way of solving problems of the society, Mr Ahmed said.

“Another girl cadre said she left her group because she was disenchanted with the Maoists’ violent lifestyle and many other young cadres too were planning to surrender,” said Mr Ahmed, referring to 18-year-old Lalmuni who ran away from a Maoist women’s armed guerilla squad in Jharkhand last week.

“Many Maoists cadres are disillusioned with their movement. They want to leave the path of violence and want to join their democratic mainstream,” he said.

Communist Party of India [Maoist] West Bengal State Committee member Akash, who uses one name, said yesterday in a statement that the government would not be able to “buy-out oppressed and protesting masses” and would not be able to solve the crisis in the region.

“The government is trying to lure away our comrades with money. But our party workers are driven by a high level of dedication. They will all reject such surrender and rehab offers outright. No true Maoist can fall prey to such mean temptations,” said Akash.

Landmines recovered in Orissa, 6 Maoists held
Bhubaneswar, Aug 3: Two unexploded landmines were found in Sundergarh district of Orissa.

According to the police, the landmines were found fitted under two separate culverts during a combing operation by the police on Tuesday, Aug 3.

Six Maoist guerrillas were also arrested and they would be produced in a local court on Tuesday, Aug 3, Superintendent of Police Diptesh Patnaik said.

The rebels were held from Kalta area of the Maoist-infested Bonai sub-division, about 450 km from Bhubaneswar.

“Maoists planted landmines under two separate culverts to trigger blasts, thankfully we recovered the landmines,” Diptesh Patnaik said.

“They were involved in several crimes, including the murder of trade union leader Thomas Munda in Jan 2010,” Patnaik added.

FARMERS have threatened to blockade billions of dollars of coal seam gas development unless the State Government imposes a moratorium and delivers answers on environmental issues on the Western Downs and Surat Basin.

More than 200 farmers are expected to rally at Cecil Plains, west of Toowoomba, today to voice their anger and demand more science is done on the gas industry’s impact on some of the state’s best cropping land and the vital Great Artesian Basin.

Basin Sustainability Alliance chairman Ian Hallyor said if the Government did not impose a moratorium “we will do our own”. “We will blockade every site they want to go on,” Mr Hallyor said.

The coal seam gas development feeds not only domestic gas consumption but also planned liquefied natural gas export plants at Gladstone which could provide more than $55 billion worth of development and 18,000 jobs.

But it must access farmland, drill holes and build wells, roads, pipelines, dams and compression stations and some of it is on the best cropping land in Queensland west of Toowoomba.

Today’s rally will be held on one property that is expected to lose about 40ha of land for gas operations. The owners would receive compensation of about $50,000 a year but the economic loss was more like $500,000, Mr Hallyor said.

“No one will buy a farm with a gas well on it. The value is virtually zero,” he said. “It’s going to affect hundreds of properties.”

The blockade threat came as Natural Resources Minister Steven Robertson said that he could not rule out burying salt – which was a byproduct of the CSG production – in landfill even though he was adamant that no environmental damage would be done.

“Development cannot come at any cost,” Mr Robertson said. “The development of that industry … must be environmentally sustainable.”

PARIS — Strikes at French refineries looked likely to spread as Exxonmobil employees Friday were called to join a protest at oil giant Total that has shut down seven plants and raised fears of supply cuts.

Total’s management told AFP they had started halting refining operations after unions extended their two-day strike to an unlimited action.

The CGT union then called for a one-day strike at the two refineries in France run by Exxonmobil, the biggest US oil company, to support the Total workers, citing similar restructuring proposals at Exxonmobil.

The Total strike on Friday affected seven of the company’s 31 refineries which supply about half of France’s filling stations. Total insisted there was “at this stage no risk of a shortage” of fuel at the pumps.

The French Petroleum Industry Union said that the country’s depots had up to three weeks’ worth of fuel.

The management of Total, which is under pressure after announcing possible job cuts last month, said there was “a hardening of the movement” since unions on Wednesday had only announced a two-day strike.

The director of the Feyzin refinery, Jean-Pierre Poncin, said however that “if the strike continues, there will be tension in the Rhone-Alpes region (in southern France) in the coming days” since some oil depots were also on strike.

Employees on Thursday voted for “an unlimited strike at all the plants” in France, Charles Foulard, a leader of the CGT trade union at Total, told AFP.

The energy giant last month said it was studying a permanent closure of a refinery in Dunkirk, which employs 370 people directly and 450 sub-contractors.

Total has come under pressure from the government to guarantee jobs after President Nicolas Sarkozy said that fighting unemployment was a priority.

Move aimed at protecting Clinch River, already polluted by one billion gallons of coal ash

Nashville, TN — Ann Harris, 70, remembers growing up near the Clinch River in Tennessee, frequently swimming and fishing its waters with her family. For the past few decades, the river has changed drastically. Its once clear waters now look and smell like sewage, which led Harris to sell her ancestral home and move away eight years ago.

Read more…

Nov. 21 (Bloomberg) — A coal-mine explosion in the northeastern Chinese province of Heilongjiang killed 42 miners and left 66 missing, Xinhua News Agency said on its Web site.

The explosion happened at 2:30 a.m. at Xinxing mine where 528 miners were working, the State Administration of Work Safety said on its Web site. Rescue efforts are under way, according to the statement.

The explosion destroyed the mine’s ventilation and communication system, making it difficult for rescue, China Central Television reported on its Web site.

China relies on coal to generate 80 percent of its electricity. A coal-mine explosion in the southwestern Chinese city of Chongqing on May 30 killed 30 workers and another coal- mine blast in Shanxi province on Feb. 22 left 74 miners dead, according to the government.

Xinxing mine, owned by Heilongjiang Longmei Mining Holding Group Co., has an annual production capacity of 1.45 million tons of coal, according to the statement.

China’s death toll from coal mine accidents fell 12 percent in the first seven months of this year from a year earlier after the government closed small pits to improve safety, according to Luo Lin, head of the State Administration of Work Safety.

–Jiang Jianguo. Editors: Sean Collins, John Chacko.

from: http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aW2Vn7_VJ3eU&pos=9

Some 60,000 metric tons of radioactive waste is stored at nuclear power plants across the country, awaiting federal action that’s already a decade late.

WISCASSET, Maine

Standing on the end of Bailey Point, looking out on a cold, blue inlet of the Atlantic, you’d never know a nuclear power plant once stood here.

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Observer investigation uncovers link between dramatic rise in birth defects in Punjab and pollution from coal-fired power stations

Their heads are too large or too small, their limbs too short or too bent. For some, their brains never grew, speech never came and their lives are likely to be cut short: these are the children it appears that India would rather the world did not see, the victims of a scandal with potential implications far beyond the country’s borders.

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CHARLESTON, W.Va. — Two mountaintop-removal opponents took to the trees of Raleigh County on Tuesday, hoping to shut down a Massey Energy operation they say is blasting dangerously close to nearby homes.

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NEW DELHI (Reuters) – India’s greenhouse gas emissions are expected to jump to between 4 billion tonnes and 7.3 billion tonnes in 2031 but the Asian power’s rapid economic growth will be sustainable, a government-backed report said on Wednesday.

Per-capita emissions are estimated to rise to 2.1 tonnes by 2020 and 3.5 tonnes by 2030, according to a government-funded study by five different organisations, including environmental groups and the management consultancy firm, McKinsey.

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U2′s desire to save the planet has been rather undermined by the revelation that the band have a carbon footprint big enough to fly them to Mars and back. Read more…

Felicity Barringer

The definition of renewable energy seems clear cut: The sun continues to shine, so solar energy is renewable. The wind continues to blow, so wind turbines churn out renewable power.

But industries are now pushing to have a growing number of other technologies categorized as renewable — or at least as environmentally advantageous. They include nuclear power plants and the burning of garbage and even the waste from coal mines.

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The smart network would send its data through the power network

Global electricity networks could become smart grids that can help us monitor and control our energy usage, if plans from net firm Cisco take off.

The giant US firm, whose technology helps underpin the net, is building a two-way link into electricity grids.

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Oil prices have almost doubled since January

Oil prices have risen above $58 a barrel amid fears that attacks on oil facilities in Nigeria could lead to shortages in oil supply.

US crude rose by $1.82 to $58.16 a barrel, while London Brent crude was up $2.02 to $58.00.
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By Jianjun Tu

A methane blast at the Tunlan coal mine in Shanxi on February 22 killed 78 miners and the last body was not recovered until five days later.

China’s numerous collieries, most of them township and village enterprises (TVEs), have long been the world’s most deadly. Since the inception of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) in 1949, official sources have put China’s cumulative coal mining fatalities at more than 250,000, and independent estimates are much higher. While the official coal mining death tolls in 2008 were 3,210, a 54% drop compared with 6,995 in 2002, China’s 2008 fatality rate of 1.182 deaths per million tonnes of coal mined means that the world’s largest coal producer’s safety standard still lags far behind the second largest one, the United States, by at least 55 years.[1]

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