We live in interesting times. Technology is moving very fast – faster than safety research can keep up with. Preliminary peer-reviewed science suggests that we should be cautious, and that children are particularly vulnerable, but mainstream science has not yet had the funding or the time to catch up.
Even worse, agencies such as the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) are strongly influenced by lobbyists from the industry they are charged with regulating. Unfortunately, we can’t assume that FCC guidelines will do anything more than protect the industry it is supposed to regulate.
For the critics out there who aren’t going to read the research I linked, I’ll just say this. The human nervous system is an electrical system that sends weak but precise signals to the brain, making it possible for us to move, think, and feel. Humans are composed of 60% saline water, which is an excellent electrical conductor. An enormous amount of research is being done on Electromagnetic Compatibility Testing to make sure that different electrical devices; 4G devices vs. 5G devices vs. AT&T vs. Verizon, don’t conflict with one another. It is generally accepted that delicate components on a printed circuit board can be affected by dirty electricity created by other components. So why do we just assume that the human electrical system isn’t affected by all of this? It makes no logical sense.
Anyway, the rest of the world will get there, but in the meantime, those of us with vulnerable family members need to future proof our homes so that our loved ones are safe inside of them.
At the same time, the reality is that we’re not going back to 1964. Most people need to stay connected at all times, for work, school, streaming music and shows, and, let’s not forget, social media. Fossil fuels are running out, and renewable energy and efficient appliances aren’t optional. Until manufacturers prioritize the health of living beings in their innovation, harmful EMF radiation is here to stay. So what can we do about it?
My family has EHS – Electromagnetic Hypersensitivity. Perhaps we’re more affected by EMFs than others. Perhaps we’re just more aware of it. Regardless, we’ve had to figure out how to minimize EMFs in our environment. At the same time, my husband works from home for a tech company, and my kids homeschool with Zoom-based classes based all over the US. Me? I spent a little too much time on Facebook.
My family is building a high performance home that runs completely on electricity; no propane or natural gas appliances, and no wood burning stove. Our power pole can accommodate a max of 300 amps for 2 homes. That’s all the power we have available to us. Even if we had unlimited power, we’re in California, where PG&E is paying for fire-related lawsuits by raising rates on a regular basis. Our power often goes out and we need solar, batteries, and a generator for the times when it does.
We have to continue our connected lives, and we have to do it efficiently and safely. I’ll tell you what we did in this post. I’m not a building biologist; just a mom who wants her family to thrive. This blog post explains the practical trade-offs we made in building an EMF safe home.
Location
We used to live in the Bay Area, California. We had to move away. Whether it was from pollution, EMFs, or some combination, we were dying there. When I go back, I feel the EMF radiation in my jaw (prior home of many metal dental fillings) and I feel… I guess like I’m vibrating, for lack of a better word. And the migraines, ugh, the migraines. And insomnia. And did I mention that I’ve survived cancer, twice? And my kids had PANS? Some people can continue to live amongst other humans. We couldn’t.
Regardless of where you end up, here are some things to think about when assessing a location.
I’ve known for a while how important it is to test a home for mold before buying or renting. I’ve recently had an “aha” moment that it’s also necessary to test a location for EMF before committing. For anyone, but especially for the canaries amongst us, it’s important to have a “quiet” EMF environment. Some EMF hazards can be remediated. For others, there’s just no fix. Those need to be avoided if at all possible.
Try not to live, work, or go to school next to high voltage power lines. Normal power lines are everywhere. It’s the high voltage, high current ones you want to avoid.
High voltage, high current power lines can create very unhealthy electric and magnetic fields. These magnetic fields can triple in hot summer weather when people are running air conditioning. Here’s a good article on measuring EMF from power lines.
Steer clear of cell towers, too. Note that in the US, many schools earn much-needed funds by agreeing to have a cell tower placed on their campus. This isn’t good for young developing brains, but until the rest of the world figures that out, choose your child’s school wisely. Don’t live near them, either. While further away is better than close, there is no rule of thumb. It’s imperative to take actual RF measurements with the correct RF meter in order to determine the frequencies emitted by a specific cell tower.
One smart meter is bad enough, but often, apartment buildings will have a bank of smart meters all in one place. If you’re renting an apartment, make sure the smart meters aren’t on your exterior wall, or anywhere near it, preferably. Anywhere you live, check where smart meters are; both yours and your neighbors’. Smart meters are often associated with electricity but they are used for propane and natural gas as well.
In some states, like California, you can request that the utility company remove your smart meter and replace it with an older analog meter. You may have to pay a recurring fee which basically covers the cost for someone to come out and read the meter every month or two.
Why are smart meters harmful? This award-winning documentary is an intriguing watch.
Everyone has wifi, and almost anywhere you go, you’ll be surrounded by it. If you’re considering buying land or moving, pull up wifi on your phone and see how many connections you’ll need to contend with. In a city, it will be many.
Image Credit: Getty Images
Consider the topography. There is a reason that cell towers are always high up. Reception is better. Don’t turn yourself into an antenna by living on top of a hill in a crowded area.
That said, this advice is in direct conflict with a best practice for building a mold safe home. You want to be on the top of a hill for drainage, so you don’t get water draining down a hill into your foundation.
Personally, we chose to build on top of a hill, but in a sparsely populated area that doesn’t currently have much radiation. Hopefully it will stay that way.
Build site and home layout
Have all of your own Smart Meters replaced with analog meters, if possible. If not, shield them. Put them on a wall that people don’t spend time in; ideally a garage wall.
Don’t put your main electrical panel on a bedroom wall. All of the electricity in the home routes through the main panel. You don’t want it to be right by someone’s head when they’re sleeping. Put the panel on a wall that people don’t spend time near. A garage wall also works for this.
Dirty Electricity
Let’s begin at the beginning. What is dirty electricity, you might ask?
A pure sine wave, or perfect electricity, would look like this. Every wave is the same.
Dirty electricity might look like this. Waves vary and are erratic in form and timing.
Let’s make a baseball analogy. Perfect electricity is like batting balls from a pitching machine. The balls get pitched the same way, to the same place, with the same timing, every time. It’s easy to get into a rhythm.
Dirty electricity is like batting balls pitched by a team of Little Leaguers. You just never know what’s coming next, or when.
Some state of the art appliances and fixtures create enormous amounts of dirty electricity. Setting aside the issue of how this affects the human electrical system, there is widespread acknowledgement that delicate electrical devices, such as computers and televisions, work better and last longer when you use a pure sine wave inverter to even out the voltage. It stands to reason that the human electrical system would also function better with more even voltage.
You can protect all of the electrical systems in your home, sentient and non, by using devices and fixtures that create cleaner electricity. If that’s not possible, you can at least smooth out most of the waves with a dirty electricity filter.
A few of the devices that are notorious for creating dirty electricity include:
- Solar inverters. Note that the solar panels themselves are basically inert. It’s the inverter that creates dirty electricity when it converts DC (battery) electricity to AC (outlet) electricity. As a general rule, micro inverters tend to create better quality current. Inverters that use MOSFET switching are cleaner than those that use IGBTs. We are figuring out our solar system right now. I’ll write a dedicated post on EMF safety and solar systems once ours is installed and tested.
- Smart meters
- Dimmer switches, some LED lights, and all CFL light bulbs
- Minisplits.
- Home built gamer PCs. Ours tested badly. We are going to test out a new power supply and metal tower and see if we can make it cleaner.
- Variable Speed pool pumps, well pumps and HVAC motors
- Induction cooktops
Note that if you’re connected to the grid (as most of us are) dirty electricity can also come through your meter. We had high levels of DE coming in at our service entrance, before it even got into our home. What your neighbors do affects you, too.
A reasonable approach when building a new home might be:
- Avoid installing common sources of DE as much as you can. Get rid of your Smart Meter if you can (knowing that DE can still come in from your neighbor’s Smart Meter.)
- Don’t install dimmer switches. Install cleaner LED lights. We’ll be installing these, because our EMF consultant tested them and they tested clean.
- Install cleaner HVAC. Mitsubishi minisplits are rumored to be cleaner, but you’d need to test the specific unit you want to use to be sure. Our Fujitsu minisplit creates high levels of DE. But its also the one our mold-sensitive HVAC designer recommended, so we opted to keep it and install filtering.
- Use MC (Metal Clad) Cable instead of Romex, and metal electrical boxes and faceplates, to keep the DE contained instead of radiating through your walls.
- Install a filter/shutoff switch during rough electrical such as the EMF Safe Switch to smooth out the electricity sine waves, and also automate turning off the bedroom and adjacent circuits while you sleep so that you have a cleaner sleep sanctuary.
Wiring
Wire the home with MC (Metal Clad) Cable rather than plastic-coated Romex. The metal cladding contains all of the dirty electricity and electric fields inside of it. Romex radiates dirty electricity and electric fields through your entire home.
Your electrician may whine about how much MC Cable costs and give you a sky high “I don’t want this project” bid to install it. Find another electrician if this happens. Commercial electricians use it all the time. The material cost is not much more than the Romex. My husband has wired houses with both, and he found the MC Cable easier to use.
Don’t forget to use MC cable for things like HVAC and dishwashers that are normally wired with Romex. If your HVAC guy won’t use MC Cable, have your electrician replace his Romex.
Use metal electrical boxes and metal face plates, too. This keeps all of the current in the wiring, where it belongs.
A home should have only one system grounding electrode (earth rod.) Multiple earth grounding points can create hazardous magnetic fields via loop currents.
Networking
Now is the time to run ethernet cable everywhere in the home so that you don’t have to use Wifi. Places to consider running ethernet:
- Office areas (duh)
- All bedrooms
- The couch and/or living room chairs
- Kitchen island and/or dining room table
- Any appliances that will need to connect to the internet, including Smart TVs, HRVs, etc.
- Garage or shop
- Even the patio, if you might want to read your email in your backyard
Make sure you use shielded and grounded ethernet cable. It keeps the electric field inside. Use shielded everything: wall jacks, and cables, both for router connections and connections to devices.
Most devices default to wifi these days. To use ethernet instead, make sure you turn off wifi on the device, and then use an adapter to connect to ethernet. We’ve tried several and most of them break fairly quickly. The Belkin brand is more expensive but tends to last longer. This is the adapter for the iPad. This is the adapter for Macs. Most PCs still come with an ethernet port.
Wall assembly and insulation
Even though we are far from most cell towers, our outdoor wireless radiation measured around 10 µW per square meter. That’s not terrible, but it’s still in the “concern” category.
Inside the home, it measured less than .1. That’s pretty much as good as it gets.
The wall assembly of this home is Hardiplank siding, a rainscreen, Zip-R Sheathing, Rockwool insulation, and Denshield Tile backer wall. Something in that assembly, or a combination of everything, is proving to be a good insulator. I have no way of knowing for sure, but I have a hunch it’s mainly the Rockwool insulation. This study agrees with my hunch.
We like the Rockwool anyway for other reasons. If installed correctly, it doesn’t leave gaps (which create a condensation risk) like faced fiberglass can, it is impervious to fire and water, and it’s easy to install. Its potential effectiveness as an EMF shield is just icing on the cake. Rockwool will be our choice of insulation going forward.
Our windows have Low E glass, which reflects heat, but also EMF radiation.
If you live in a high EMF area, there are options for shielding you can build into your wall, including shielding paint, window film, and a builder grade perforated (and thus vapor permeable – important) aluminum foil you can place in your wall between the insulation and drywall. These options should be approached with caution for a few reasons.
First, they shield inside as well. So you may find you can’t get a WiFi or cellular connection inside a shielded room. Worse, if you do use an EMF-radiating device, such as a cell phone, the walls will amplify and bounce the signal around inside the room, potentially making exposure worse.
Also, these things shield you from all radiation. Not all radiation is bad for us. In particular, the Schumann Resonance is a low frequency wavelength emitted by the Earth itself that has positive effects on the human body, particularly with respect to the nervous and cardiovascular system. Shielding all radiation will also shield you from the positive benefits of the Schumann Resonance.
If you build an EMF shield into your walls, and find it doesn’t work for you, the only way to remove it is to rip out the drywall. Therefore, before you go this route, it’s highly advised to consult with an EMF consultant to determine whether the positives outweigh the negatives.
Kitchen
Kitchens are a “damned if you do, damned if you don’t” type situation.
Propane stoves emit pollution. Induction stoves emit high levels of magnetic energy, and sometimes dirty electricity too. Microwaves also emit high levels of magnetic energy.
Your best bet is to get a regular resistance heating electric stove/oven.
We are building a tight passive house. We do not want propane polluting our tight house. We don’t have enough available electricity for an inefficient electric stove, and even if we did, I’m too much of a foodie snob for one. I love my induction oven. I know I shouldn’t have a microwave, but I’m a busy mom and time’s a-wasting. The “reheat” and “beverage” buttons on my microwave are already showing wear.
Our induction stove tested high in both dirty electricity and magnetic fields. For our induction stove, the things I do to mitigate exposure are:
- We have a shutoff that cuts power to the stove at night while we sleep. Realistically, it usually gets turned on to make dinner, and stays off the rest of the time.
- The control panel is on the back of the stove, not the front.
- I cook with cast iron and silicon utensils. I try not to complete the circuit by touching the pan.
- I try not to stand in front of the stove and watch my pots boil. Radiation is very strong right in front of the stove, but drops off quickly.
- I try to use back burners whenever possible.
Similarly, when I use the microwave, I put something in it and walk away.
Realistically, I spend a small fraction of my day making meals or heating up water for tea. If I were a professional chef and spent all day in front of my stove, or if I were more sensitive, I might have different priorities. My way isn’t perfect. But it works for me.
Living room
Bluetooth speakers use wireless radiation and emit EMFs. You might consider wiring for surround sound speakers before you drywall, if a home theater is important to you.
If you get a smart TV, get one that allows ethernet connection rather than wifi. We have a Sony OLED TV that connects via ethernet.
Then, check to make sure the TV is actually off when you think it’s off. We unplug our TV when we’re not using it.
Bedrooms
The bedrooms are the most important place to make EMF safe. You want to build a sleep sanctuary with as little radiation as possible. Here’s a page from our EMF consultant, Eric Windheim, that offers some recommendations.
As we found, if you use MC cable and metal boxes and face plates, even if you have high levels of dirty electricity in the home, it will stay contained inside the cable or conduit. However, if you then plug in lamps or clocks, those non-shielded cords will be coursing with dirty electricity all night long, even if the appliance is turned off. Therefore your best bet is to use rechargeable or battery powered lamps rather than plug anything into the outlets. By code, you have to install outlets in the bedrooms. You don’t have to use them.
Don’t make the mistake I did and sleep on a heating pad or under a heated blanket, even one that claims to be EMF reducing. If you have dirty electricity, covering your skin with an electrified blanket is equivalent to covering yourself with dirty electricity. Get a warm down comforter or put on a pair of socks instead.
My family sleeps best if we turn off the circuit breakers for the bedrooms and adjacent rooms at night. We might at some point automate this with a sleep switch so we don’t wear out the circuit breakers.
If you are in a high EMF area, an option to consider might be adding an EMF-blocking bed shield after you move in. My family used these when we still lived in the Bay area and did find they made a difference. They don’t block all frequencies, but they definitely reduce levels. Don’t forget to also block the floor for 360 degree protection.
Working with a building biologist
Like I said before, I’m just a mom. I can tell you what worked in our particular situation, but that may have no bearing on your situation or your home. The only way to know for sure is to measure. This isn’t voodoo. All of the types of EMF I talk about in this article can be measured, and a Certified Electromagnetic Radiation Specialist/Building Biologist will have both the knowledge and the tools to measure it. We are working with Eric Windheim
Ideally, you’d work with an experienced and certified EMF consultant to test the site before you start building, get guidance while you are building, and test the electrical once it’s energized.
Since we specifically bought multiple acres away from cities, high voltage power lines, and cell towers, we did not have Eric perform a site test before we bought the land. That said, if you are buying or doing renovations anywhere near a city or have any doubts at all, you should have an EMF consultant do a site test before you commit. If you are in the market for real estate and you need multiple sites tested, or you have some concerns and want to do multiple measurements over time, it might be more efficient to buy your own meter. The article I linked above suggested one.
Once you’ve found land you’re happy with, the next step is building safely. The tricky part of building is that there’s nothing that anyone can test inside a building until the electrical is finalized and energized, but the time you need the most guidance is when you’re doing rough electrical. We hired Eric to test our architect’s home, since our build is similar and we wanted to figure out some things at the design phase. Based on the results of that testing we decided NOT to use a Tesla Powerwall and instead to use a different solar inverter. We also made general changes to our electrical plan, such as moving our main panel to an outside wall that isn’t shared with a bedroom. I’ve written this article to try to fill the knowledge gap of things to be aware of while you are in the building phase. Every situation is different and you’ll get the best advice for your specific situation by working with an EMF consultant yourself, but hopefully this gives you some general guidelines.
The only way to make sure that your electrician follows your EMF consultant’s recommendations is to put your requirements in the design and get a bid based on exactly what you want them to do, and make sure it’s in the contract. If you want them to use MC Cable and metal boxes and wire with shielded ethernet everywhere, write that down and get a bid for that exact thing, so that they can charge you appropriately and so that they actually do it.
An EMF consultant can do a much better job checking for wiring code violations than a building inspector. My husband was our electrician, but if you’re hiring an electrician, the time to have a building biologist out to take final measurements is before you make final payment to your electrician. That way, if there are any wiring code violations, you have some leverage to get them fixed.
Building in an EMF safe way is certainly not easy, but it’s definitely possible. I hope this gives you enough information to get you started.
