A PG&E Diwali
Diwali is the festival of lights, and PG&E forced most of the Bay Area to light up Diyas this year.
Why is California Resembling a 3rd World Country?
1. Aging Infrastructure… some close to a 100 years old
…found that nearly 30% of the remaining towers in that system, more than 3,500, were installed in the 1900s and 1910s. About 60% of the structures in the 230-kilovolt system were built between 1920 and 1950.
PG&E has told state regulators it has struggled to consolidate data on the condition of its equipment. Kevin Dasso, PG&E’s vice president of electric asset management until earlier this year, said the lack of comprehensive information made it difficult to determine which transmission lines were approaching the point of failure.
One leg of the Caribou-Valona network, known as the Ignacio-Mare Island line, delivers power to an electric switchyard at the edge of a high-fire-risk area in Marin County north of the Golden Gate Bridge and a now-closed naval shipyard. At least 28 of the towers on the line have been in place since 1921, according to a company inventory.
2. Coupled with a Lack of Maintenance
In 2012, PG&E requested a $4.84 billion rate increase over three years that it said was needed to ensure grid reliability — which has become more challenging due to increased renewable generation — and replace aging equipment. TURN urged customers to “speak out against PG&E’s greediest grab yet” at public hearings, and the Public Utilities Commission ultimately approved a $2.4 billion rate increase.
Nobody likes paying more for power, but environmental groups worry that customers might turn against the state’s climate goals if they find out the price they’re paying for green energy mandates. PG&E rates are double the national average and have climbed 41% since 2010 — about four times the nationwide rate.
In 2014, PG&E warned in its annual report that “to relieve some of this upward rate pressure, the CPUC could authorize lower revenues than the Utility requested.” Two years later, the commission approved a mere 1% revenue increase, which hasn’t been enough to finance critical grid repairs and upgrades.
Thanks to the utility’s stakeholder model, customers will wind up paying much more for their power — or lack of it.
3. With Single Liability in a complex system
California law finds utilities liable whether or not they are negligent if their equipment is in any way involved in the start of a fire, and the company’s only possible recourse is to shut off power in the event of red-alert-fire weather events.
Note that it’s widely known that there are other agencies involved in clearing the forest that surrounds transmission lines to help mitigate, but the liability solely rests with PG&E.
“PG&E certainly has lots of problems on its plate. However, where is the forest management? The forests are full of dead trees and underbrush. The laws make it hard if not impossible to economically clean up the dead trees and debris. The fires will happen again if we do not get better forest management.” — Walter Zaks
4. And a spectrum of suggestions to fix
4.1 “Let’s not pay shareholders!”
“Dividends and infrastructure investments are not a zero sum game,” the company stated Wednesday. “Rather, dividends facilitate investment in infrastructure, because the steady payment of dividends is essential to raising new capital from investors.”
4.2 “Let’s make it a non-profit!”
Why Switching to a non-profit isn’t the right solution
Puerto Rico’s experience with a government-owned electricity monopoly — the Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority (Prepa) — is worth a look-see before Californians flick the switch to nonprofit. Granted, Prepa was plagued by corruption, but years of inadequate power-grid investment and excessive borrowing led to bankruptcy in 2017, two months before Puerto Rico was slammed by Hurricane Maria. Mary Anastasia O’Grady in “The Truth About Hurricane Maria” (Americas, Sept. 17, 2018) pointed to Puerto Rico’s mismanagement of its power grid and the grid’s failure as major contributors to Hurricane Maria’s death toll. Nearly half of Prepa’s generating capacity still was down two months later.
4.3 “Let’s give it completely to the government!”
“What would happen if PG&E closed its doors and turned the whole thing over to the government? On Long Island, the government took over after bankrupting the local utility over 30 years ago. Now, we have some of the highest costs for electric in the nation and we rarely see any maintenance being performed … Beware California, the same could happen to you
The one-party rule in Sacramento continues to control and pretends to know how to run businesses better than the private sector, with “social justice” the primary mission statement. Does anyone see the irony in Sacramento promoting the purchase of electric vehicles through tax subsidies and then turning off the electricity that makes them run?
4.4 “Leave it to the people!”
Solar cells on your roof can’t power your blackouts… not without an inverter.
After spending $20,000 — $30,000 on installing solar panels, you need to cough up $8000- $10,000 on installing batteries, such as Powerwalls from Tesla.
It’s not a surprise that their deployment has grown 81%.
Your thoughts?
