Contractors with PG&E work in a trench to lay underground electric cables in Placer County on Oct. 17, 2024.If you're enjoying this article, you'll love our daily newsletter, The LA Report. Each weekday, catch up on the 5 most pressing stories to start your morning in 3 minutes or less.Diane Moss lost her home in the Santa Monica Mountains after power lines ignited the apocalyptic Woolsey Fire in 2018. Since then, she’s pressed for a safer electric grid in California.
And the costs are projected to keep rising: The three companies — Pacific Gas & Electric, Southern California Edison and San Diego Gas & Electric — continue to seek billions more from customers for wildfire prevention spending. Rates are expected to continue outpacing inflationin the nation, outside of Hawaii. Other reasons include rooftop solar incentives, new transmission systems and upgrades for electric vehicles.
The same day as the destruction in Paradise, another fire ignited some 470 miles south. In the Simi Hills of Ventura County, Southern California Edisonmade contact with others, triggering “arc” flashes that rained hot metal fragments and sparks onto the dry brush below. These triggered two blazes, which soon merged to form the Woolsey Fire.
Three people died. Moss’ home was gone, reduced to a hollowed out structure and charred rubble, along with about 100,000 acres ofThe 2021 Dixie Fire, which claimed one life and destroyed 1,311 structures, was the last catastrophic wildfire in California confirmed to be caused by utility equipment.The number of fires triggered by the companies’ equipment fluctuates from year to year, driven by the huge variability in California’s weather.
But it opened the door to increased spending by utilities beyond limits set in the highly deliberative process known as their general rate cases, which determine what Californians pay.paid for by Wall Street investors and California ratepayers to help PG&E exit bankruptcy and protect utilities from being financially threatened by the wildfires they cause. The utilities cannot access the state’s $21 billion fund unless their wildfire plans are approved by the energy safety office.
Lynch is skeptical of utilities and their big projects because they can profit from them, and Mark Toney, executive director of The Utility Reform Network, says too much spending is going unchecked. Some expenses, such as operating costs, have an immediate impact on how much people pay in their bills. But other costs, such as long-term investments in insulating or burying power lines, are stretched out over years, meaning they add to bills for