The gas and electricity giant has drawn ire from local officials such as the Board of Supervisors, who say PG&E hasn't done enough to show that it’s keeping people safe from California’s catastrophic fires, intensified by a warming world.
But now, as raging wildfires and power shutoffs have become an all too familiar feature of the hot summer months, city leaders are once again applying pressure on the utility, raising questions about its track record of sparking catastrophic fires.
The board’s decision comes just months after the utility giant paid $55 million to settle civil cases across six counties and avoid criminal prosecution for sparking last year’s Dixie fire — the second-largest in California’s history, which scorched an area larger than the state of Rhode Island. Critics of PG&E, though, claim its hiking up rates for wildfire-related mitigation efforts, like grid hardening and under-grounding power lines, while paying dividends to its top executives. The company’s chief executive, Patricia Poppe, brought home over $50 million in total compensation last year — and advocates argue this happened while ratepayers have seen a continual increase in their monthly bills.
One alternative is something called Golden State Energy, which was created by a state bill passed in 2020 in the event that PG&E failed to emerge from bankruptcy.
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