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Contrasts of competence as California assesses power cuts and utility pole route management

14 October 2019 by Steve Blum
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Pge outages 9oct2019

California’s privately-owned electric utilities and their regulators have a long and difficult job ahead as they try to figure out what was good and what was bad about last week’s massive wildfire prevention power cuts. Their eventual conclusions will have a significant impact on how utility pole routes are managed in California, including possible new, and more costly, design standards, and budgets for maintenance and wildfire prevention. Those costs will ultimately be shared with telecommunications companies that also use those poles.… More

Broadband deployment will be more rigorous and costly in California, following U.S. supreme court ruling

9 October 2019 by Steve Blum
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Southern California Gas and Electric can’t pass on wildfire costs to ratepayers. The federal supreme court declined to hear SDG&E’s appeal of a California Public Utilities Commission decision that put some of the burden of a 2007 series of wildfires on company shareholders. California’s strict “inverse condemnation” law requires utilities to bear the full cost of any damage when their pole routes, or other equipment in the right of way, is even partially to blame. Monday’s decision lets that principle stand.… More

Electric utilities will decide when to cut power in the face of fire threats

8 May 2019 by Steve Blum
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Californian electric utilities will have clearer guidance on how, if not when, to shut down – de-energise – local power lines when the danger of sparking a wildfire is at its peak. That’s assuming a decision drafted by California Public Utilities Commission president Michael Picker is approved later this month. It’s not the full and final instruction manual, but it’s a start. The new procedures will be in place for this year’s wildfire season and can be improved as time goes on.… More

SCE asks court to extend wildfire liability to cities and counties, too

22 January 2019 by Steve Blum
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santa barbara county flood map

If a local government allows homes to be built in high risk communities and doesn’t build or manage infrastructure in a way that mitigates that risk, could it be as responsible for disasters as an electric company that similarly installs and operates electric lines to serve those areas? That question was handed to a Los Angeles County superior court judge on Friday by Southern California Edison.

SCE’s wildfire liability problem isn’t as apocalyptic as Pacific Gas and Electric’s, but by any other measure it’s bad.… More

More people, more fire hazards, more damage costs for utilities, at least for now CPUC says

1 December 2017 by Steve Blum
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San Diego Gas and Electric’s shareholders will have to pick up the tab for $379 million of the $2.4 billion worth of damage (and legal fees) caused by a series of wildfires in 2007. Yesterday, the California Public Utilities Commission unanimously approved a draft decision by an administrative law judge that assigned the blame to SDG&E because, as commissioner Carla Peterman put it, SDG&E “failed to meet its burden to prove it was a prudent manager”.… More

California wildfires are everyone's problem, regardless of who's at fault

27 November 2017 by Steve Blum
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The recent wildfires that struck seemingly everywhere all at once, but particularly hard in the northern California wine country, might have been caused, in part, by wind whipped electric lines surrounded by a canopy of dense, dry trees. If that’s what happened, then electric companies, and particularly PG&E, could be liable for billions of dollars worth of damage.
It poses a difficult public policy question: who pays? Ratepayers, shareholders or taxpayers?
Coincidentally, the California Public Utilities Commission is due to decide that question at this week’s meeting, at least in regards to a series of wildfires in San Diego County in 2007.… More

Clearing the way for better infrastructure in California

8 November 2013 by Steve Blum
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It costs more here.

California’s infrastructure was “designed for 25 million people”, state treasurer Bill Lockyer told an opening breakout session at the California Economic Summit in Los Angeles. The problem, he said, is that California will have 50 millon people before there’s a fix in place.

The focus was on roads and water – publicly funded projects – but it’s equally true for infrastructure that’s supported by private capital, such as telecommunications and energy.

That conversation was mostly about ways to funnel more tax dollars towards road maintenance and construction but as the conference moved on, the cost side of the equation took center stage.… More