Hundreds of thousands PG&E customers face yet another blackout

(Bloomberg) — Hundreds of thousands of Californians are once again facing the prospect of a deliberate blackout as utility giant PG&E Corp. tries to keep its power lines from igniting catastrophic wildfires.

The San Francisco-based company is considering a shutoff to about 209,000 homes and businesses this week as hot, dry winds rush in from the northeast starting late Tuesday and running through Thursday afternoon. People in 15 Northern California counties may go dark as a result, the company has said.

“Any fires that develop will likely spread rapidly,” the National Weather Service said in a report Tuesday. “Outdoor burning is not recommended.”

PG&E will decide sometime Tuesday afternoon whether to move forward with the shutoffs, PG&E Chief Executive Officer Bill Johnson said at a news conference Monday. Customers should be prepared for an outage that may last 48 hours, he said. Some parts of the state may see gusts as strong as 45 miles (72 kilometers) an hour late in the week, the weather service reported.

The threat of widespread shutoffs is hitting just two weeks after PG&E and Edison International’s Los Angeles area utility carried out the biggest planned blackout in California history, plunging more than 2 million people into darkness, halting traffic lights and forcing businesses to shut across the Bay Area. The blackout drew outrage from customers and state officials who accused PG&E of cutting service to more customers than necessary and failing to properly communicate its plans.

“More and more of our service area is considered by the state to be a high fire risk,” PG&E’s Johnson said. “We’re really dealing with a new reality here. Power shutoffs are one tool to keep the community safe.”

The risk of fire in Southern California, however, remains: One blaze erupted Monday near the affluent Pacific Palisades coastal enclave, forcing an evacuation of several streets. Los Angeles Fire Department spokesman Brian Humphrey said the cause of the fire is still under investigation. The neighborhood is served by the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power, he said.

“We’re just determined to not let that happen here,” Johnson said of blazes that have broken out in Southern California.

Low humidity will cover California this week, according to the National Weather Service, with temperatures expected to hit between 90 and 95 degrees Fahrenheit (35 Celsius). “The general pattern persists for most of the week, so they could be under the gun for potential fire issues going forward,” said Bob Oravec, a senior branch forecaster at the U.S. Weather Prediction Center in College Park, Maryland.

Inside the high-risk area is the ongoing Saddleridge Fire, which has been burning for more than a week and has consumed about 8,800 acres (3,561 hectares), according to the California Department of Forestry & Fire Protection. It is about 92% contained, Cal Fire reported.

Two years of wildfires helped push PG&E, the state’s biggest utility owner, into bankruptcy after its equipment was identified as the cause of devastating blazes that included the Camp Fire in November 2018 that killed 86 people and destroyed an entire town. The company has been taking more extreme measures since to keep its equipment from sparking more blazes.

There is little chance of rain to raise the humidity in California this week and soak potential fuel, according to Oravec. “It is going to continue to be dry with a weak Santa Ana through most of the week,” he said.

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