Pacific Gas & Electric wants to bury many of its power lines in areas threatened by wildfires.
Pacific Gas and Electric CEO Patti Poppe looks down while being interviewed during a tour of PG&E workers burying power lines in Vacaville, Calif., Wednesday, Oct. 11, 2023. PG&E wants to bury many of its power lines in areas threatened by wildfires.
The California Public Utilities Commission, whose members are appointed by Gov. Gavin Newsom, is scheduled to decide the issue next month. PG&E will make it's case in person before the commission on Wednesday. California's other big investor-owned utilities have also been putting power lines underground. Southern California Edison, the utility that covers much of central and Southern California, says it plans to bury 600 miles of power lines by 2028. San Diego Gas & Electric has buried 145 miles of power lines since 2020 and plans to do another 1,500 miles by 2031.
Poppe donned a hard hat and protective glasses to watch workers pour a concrete mixture into a freshly dug trench along a rural, two-lane road. Behind them, charred trees stood sentry on brown hills, evidence of thethat destroyed nearly 1,500 structures and killed six people. That fire was started by lightening, not PG&E's power lines, but it is a reminder of the lasting damage that wildfires can cause.
The Public Utilities Commission is considering two other plans that would include both burying power lines and using protective coverings. The plans reduce the number of power lines that PG&E could bury by at least half. One plan would raise rates by just over 12% and the other would raise rates by about 10%.
At the start of 2018, both PG&E and Southern California Edison had only 5% of their high-threat fire districts protected with either underground lines or protective covers, according to the California Public Advocates Office, the state agency that represents customers before the Public Utilities Commission.
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