Taylor Promotes EMF Scare at Thurmont Library
Kate Taylor's campaign is not selling tin foil hats. Maybe they should be.
We previously wrote about Frederick County Republican Central Committee Candidate Kate Taylor in regards to hercanoodling with a white nationalist. Taylor is also, apparently, deeply concerned about the electromagnetic field readings in the parking lot of the Thurmont library.
On Tuesday, Taylor posted to Facebook that she found the situation at the library “disturbing.” She had brought an Erickhill RT-100, a consumer-grade E-meter/H-meter, to the site and photographed the readings beneath a set of power lines. The device showed 22 V/m and 18 V/m for the electric field, and 0.27 µT and 0.20 µT for the magnetic field. She noted, with apparent alarm, that the safest place to sit was near a campaign sign.
Like most “I did my own research” types, she is wrong to be alarmed, and a closer look at her own device explains why.
Taylor’s concern, so much as it is, stems from a misunderstanding of the scale used by consumer-grade meters. Despite her panicked, fearmongering assumption that the location is dangerous, the readings visible on the screen are entirely normal, safe, and significantly below both the device’s built-in alarm thresholds and international public safety standards.
Electric Field (E-field): The meter shows a reading of 22 V/m in the top screen and 18 V/m in the bottom screen. The device’s built-in safe threshold is 40 V/m. International public exposure limits under high-voltage lines go up to 5,000 V/m.
Magnetic Field (H-field): The meter shows 0.27 µT in the top screen and 0.20 µT in the bottom screen. The device’s alert trigger is 0.40 µT. International guidelines under ICNIRP recommend a public safety limit of 100 µT, making these ambient readings completely harmless.
The readings Taylor photographed are not near the danger thresholds. They are not approaching them. They are not in the same zip code as them. Her own meter, correctly interpreted, exonerates the Thurmont library parking lot.
This is the thing about consumer EMF meters: they are sensitive enough to register ambient fields that exist everywhere, and cheap enough to be purchased by people who don’t understand what they’re measuring. The device is not saying the library is dangerous. It is functioning normally. The confusion is not the meter’s.
Taylor has been active in Frederick County politics, and her Facebook presence suggests a worldview that is, shall we say, receptive to unconventional concerns about public health and infrastructure.1 That is her prerogative. But a candidate for a position that involves vetting Republican nominees for office, managing party resources, and providing institutional guidance to local campaigns probably should not be in the business of alarming her followers about power lines that are, by every objective measure, fine.
The Frederick County Republican Central Committee has enough problems without adding electromagnetic hypersensitivity to the list.
To say nothing of marrying a white nationalist.