Heads rolled; so they've got those black stains on their records. The CEO is gone June 30, and they replaced 11 out of 14 board members. And, they've got a bunch of unhappy shareholders that don't get to see any bit of $25.5 billion dollars that might have been profit.
Short of dissolution of the company and jailing the CEO, that's as good an outcome as might be expected.
TTFN (ta ta for now)
I can do absolutely anything. I'm an expert!
It was poor city planning in a forest susceptible to forest fire from any number of fire sources that did not keep escape paths clear of fuel, did not have multiple directions for exit ... honestly if anyone wanted to get a lot of people killed they would build a town exactly like Paradise.
PG&E is 100% responsible for the fire, but I think the city planners share the bulk of the responsibility for the deaths. This was just a larger version of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire.
I have heard zero about government changes to fix that. Considering that other power companies in California have started major fires without mass deaths I'd suggest focus be on expecting fires and emphasizing survivable landscaping, construction, fire detection, fire warning, and safe escape path design and maintenance.
I don't know how California works, but if this happened in Ohio, the Public Utilities Commission would have already approved rate increases to cover their costs.
Ya a lot of board members (that didn't really need a real job at all) lost them. Listen! Was that the sound of a dozen golden parachutes touching down again. Now maybe they are forced to retire and move to [fill in favorite 2nd residence location) ____________ permanently. Most of the biggest "losers" were using OPM, so sure, they must be hurting very badly about that. In comparison with a typical terrorist's sentencing, a bomb is a bomb is a bomb, I'm sorry, but it just doesn't feel like justice. It needs to get closer to "eye for eye, tooth for tooth" level.
All utilities are generally responsible for maintaining their rights of ways in good condition, free from trees, branches, rubbish, miscellaneous structures, tall grass, etc. which would supposedly include combustible materials of any kind. I don't see that part as a CA responsibility, nor an urban planning problem, although fire saftey, fire prevention planning, warning and emergency escape routes would have been the smart thing for a community in that kind of environment to implement, but they are not popular, as the property owners are often made directly responsible for mantenance costs and they also don't like anybody telling them what they can or can't do with their property. In any case, the utility will pass their costs onto those that partake of their power. The PUC will see to that.
“What I told you was true ... from a certain point of view.” - Obi-Wan Kenobi, "Return of the Jedi"
In that case, ax1e - PG&E should permanently cut all power to wood encircled towns. But CA won't let them do that. And CA won't let them use herbicides to clear brush and CA won't allow the building of roads to access the rights of way. CA won't let this happen because it damages the natural landscape in ways that CA voters just don't care for. And CA won't let them charge enough for the extra 100,000 employees required to walk the right of way and carefully transplant every seedling to a new and just as safe location; and if the seedling dies - fine them $1000 a weed for doing a bad job.
So since CA is determined to tell them exactly how they can maintain their business, CA voters should take the blame.
In a state that dictates that buildings be built to survive earthquakes and limits building heights, in some cases to prevent those lower on hills from blocking the ocean views of those higher on hills, it absolutely is a failure of urban planning and the people who authorized that construction need to be in prison.
Of course you're not going to be allowed to use herbicides. All that does is take the "renewable" out of the renewable fuel source. Herbicides do not remove combustible materials. It is likely to create more of it.
No new roads generally need to be built to access ROWs. The ROWs were located where they are because they were accessable for construction in the first place. Really difficult to construct on a ROW that was never possible to access. If access is lost for some reason, it is generally permitted to be restored.
Seedlings, other than the smaller plants and wild flowers that are used to repopulate a ROW with original species destroyed during construction, such as large tree variaties are not usually placed on the ROWs themselves. If any valuable tree would have to be destroyed while constructing on a ROW, it would first be transplanted to the side if possible. If not possible, it is not unknown to newly plant a forest of them in an alternate location as compensation. Construction in wetlands that would render the wetlands unuseable is often not permissable at all, unless a new wetland is agreed to be created in an alternate location. None of these things are new laws. They've been on the books for decades and most utilities have figured out how to invest some of their profits in that manner when they create new projects.
If all the rest of that is true, why did the defense not pick up on those reasons. Why did PGE plead GUILTY, one by one to 84 counts, apparently without raising a single argument?
I'm pretty sure that PGE is not the only utility in CA. Most likely the others have figured out how to work within that social-regulatory environment. Sounds like PGE needs to learn from others.
Instead of wheeling power around, it would seem to make sense for them to install solar power cells on the roofs, or larger scale plants that don't have to use ROW over half the state. 50' of cable will charge the batteries in the shed/basements, or use only short miles of ROW from many local solar plants to connect to more localized grids.
Let's look for solutions to how they can conduct business, instead of excuses about why they can't. You had some great ideas in your first comment.
“What I told you was true ... from a certain point of view.” - Obi-Wan Kenobi, "Return of the Jedi"
I will try to keep to the subject of engineering.
Neither PG&E nor the California regulators have to compete, and because of that they are both exceedingly lame.
Of course PG&E is guilty. However, they have taken a disproportionate share of the blame. Regulators at the county, state, and federal level - the rough equivalent of city plan checkers - certainly are not free of guilt. They have been collecting pay checks under the understanding that they are providing some level of quality assurance and public safety, which they have not nor will ever be held accountable for.
Living in California, I have heard much of the blame goes to greedy executives and global warming. This seems to work with most of the public. Political scapegoating.
Forests need management - not just immediately near power lines. PG&E - as inept and corrupt as they are - are not responsible for lands far away from their equipment. And without management - as has been the case in CA - fires can spread very quickly for miles.
There are many lessons for engineers to take away from the sad story, but the one not spoken is: don't trust gov't officials to actually do their job (quality control and public safety). As an engineer, quality control and quality assurance lie on your shoulders.
One issue is that traditional forest "management" does not work; many of the trees in the forest can only be "managed" through actual fire conditions. But, the same forces that allow for clear cutting allow people to build homes right against the trees, and they don't build them to be completely fire resistant, which means that there is no margin for error elsewhere in the casuality chain.
TTFN (ta ta for now)
I can do absolutely anything. I'm an expert!
IRstuff is right. Most western US forests need to burn. It's part of the forest life cycle. Some species of pines actually need pine cones to be burned in order to open and launch their seeds after a fire has passed.
In some areas of Europe where devestating fores fires have run rampant, fire protection plans are now required. Landowners, mostly those with significant holdings and identified as in fire risk and propagation zones must, at their own expense, develop, implement and maintain a fire protection plan for their property which is submitted for approval by local fire brigades. Smaller landholders can enter into a cooperative plan. In their simple form these usually consist of locating and clearing areas where combustible materials have accumulated and in some cases, clearing strips of land so as to create fire breaks, but may in more extreme circumstances even require that water wells, swimming pools, or stock tank type reservoirs be provided.
And thankfully in most states, ceder shingles are now illegal.
“What I told you was true ... from a certain point of view.” - Obi-Wan Kenobi, "Return of the Jedi"
There's a tendency to be "natural" when building in wooded areas, so there's lots of exterior wood, which has the potential to ignite with the right conditions, either radiant heat or embers. Sadly, most people who live in those areas are loathe to clear the trees to be far enough away to minimize the fire hazard.
From what I see in the news, that requires something like a several hundred feet of clearing; there have been fires where the fire easily jumped a pretty wide freeway. That kind of ruins the illusion.
TTFN (ta ta for now)
I can do absolutely anything. I'm an expert!
Similarly, many lives were lost in people wanting an 'urban' lifestyle in a forested setting. Likewises many lives were lost because residents were trapped in towns with few escape options.
Likewise the electricity provider was targeting in a lawsuit.
Personally in the Australian case I think it was a little unfair to target the electricity network provider. The conditions were a tinderbox, the single spark that causes it is hardly to blame, fires were inevitable.
I have seen previous posts for all the participants here, and you guys are all respectable.
Here's my parting shots.
1. There is no silver bullet for any problem, including fires. However, thinning the forest in neighborhoods and around neighborhoods (what I call management) is not too difficult, and will help mitigate (not completely solve) the problem of iginition and propogation. 200 trees per acre is a less dry and a more accessible forest than 300 trees per acre. Ane where I live, there are thousands of acres of 300+ trees/acre, and the gov't will not allow it to be thinned. That's a fail.
2. Utilities are not responsible for item 1 (except for a fraction of the areas near their facilities and transmission).
3. Good or bad, the gov't permeates every action of our lives. We cannot buy a toilet or a light bulb or register a car without gov't regulation. And the gov't certainly has the primary role in regulation. But when they fail, there are rarely consequences for individuals or entities. In the case of the high profile CA forest fires, the gov't is indeed partly to blame, but no gov't employee has been fired or even reprimanded. No skin in the game - no incentive or accountability - this is a poorly engineered system. If you draw a gov't salary (and generous pension), there has to be some accountability - or we get what we currently have.
As usual there is more than enough blame to go around.
Until we see criminal penalties for executives and stiff financial ones for shareholders we will continue to see similar tragedies.
"Everyone is entitled to their own opinions, but they are not entitled to their own facts."
I'm on board, provided there are also criminal penalties for gov't inspectors and regulators for gross negligence. Then they may take their roles a little more seriously.
Sentences in criminal cases serve two purposes.
Punishment.
Exemplary, to dissuade others from the same crime.
To that end I would like to see some jail time, however short.
Fines may be paid by the company or indirectly by the shareholders.
The possibility of real jail time may help other managers and CEOs to stand up to the pressures to cut corners.
Bill
--------------------
"Why not the best?"
Jimmy Carter
waross - in this case the rational answer is to remove electrical power from those wild-fire season areas permanently. I note no company vying to buy that part of the business from PG&E. Consider - three inspection employees of PG&E were recently killed carrying out the desired task. If PG&E ramps it up as suggested, it is likely as many inspection employees could be killed in just a few years as people were lost at Paradise.
