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Comment by Blackstone4 | Hacker News Reader

In this situation, I feel like it's a case of "don't blame the player, blame the game". Californian law has been structured such that if PG&E maintains equipment with best-in-class industry practises....it is still deemed to be responsible for a fire if it started at one of their sites. So what would you do? Shut the thing down...as to not cause any more fires... the fire services has shown itself not capable of containing the blazes and the weather conditions are terrible so...of course you blame the big evil company ....I'm not saying PG&E should take no blame, they should where merited but I feel like the public narrative has gone too far in one direction.

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Elsewhere in the thread somebody linked to the court order (http://s1.q4cdn.com/880135780/files/doc_downloads/2019/Alsup...), and I don't see how this explanation can possibly be correct.

In particular, (a) PG&E has a history of falsifying inspection reports, (b) PG&E must keep power lines clear of trees, (c) the power lines can't arc during high winds, (d) because of the history of falsified inspections PG&E must re-inspect things. These terms don't seem particularly onerous, especially with respect to making power lines safe during high winds---I assume that's the sort of thing every energy company does already anyway. In particular, what do you mean, in this context, when you say "best-in-class industry practises"?

Note I said, "if". I was refering to the law and what would be the implications even if they maintain best-in-class industry practises.

This wasn't so much a statement about PG&E as it was about CA law.

That is the narrative PG&E is trying to push but I am not buying it.

What seems to be the case instead is that "best-in-class industry practises" would be completely fine but are deemed to be too expensive.

So their choices are:

- Actually employ best practices.

- half-ass it and possibly be punished for it (too risky).

- Moan loudly about how horrible everything is, shutdown much more than necessary and wail how you are "forced" to do that. If you are obnoxious enough about it for long enough some legislation will be passed to allow you to half-ass it.

Ask yourself, what does the law incentivize in a situation like this?

I'm not saying that PG&E is not to blame...it may well be that they've done a bad job but it's not black & white. I feel like the opinions you outlined above reflect the public narrative… that PG&E are the devil and 100% to blame for everything when the fires were caused by multiple factors…i.e. PG&E equipment, weather conditions, fire service etc. Public narrative is a gross oversimplification and those in a position of power control that narrative (i.e. the politicians).

Those best practices are deemed too expensive by the CPUC, who has authority over the PG&E budget and retail rates.

PG&E is legally allowed only a small profit as a percentage of revenue. Without it they couldn’t raise private capital, and would require public funds directly. They have every incentive to spend as much money on maintenance as is required, assuming the politicians allow the rates to rise.

They also have an obligation to spend their safety budget ON SAFETY RELATED ACTIVITIES. Instead they blew their wad on a cash bonus for the CEO. If they can't find the money to maintain their equipment maybe it's time to claw back the $100,000,000 they stole.

Exactly. Don't give them the budget but expect them to do it anyway.

https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/PG-E-diverted-safety-...

How about we just get that money back before jacking up rates?

> don't blame the player, blame the game

I don't think this is a good excuse when dealing with public safety. We should, however, acknowledge all parties culpable.

"Over the past decade the company contributed around 245 times to political action committees which in turn made their own donations." [0]

The government is also to blame.

[0] https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/23/us/pge-california-politic...

More coverage. [1] https://www.abc10.com/article/news/investigations/governor-n... (sorry for the ads)

[2] https://www.sacbee.com/news/politics-government/capitol-aler...

Edit: Formatting

My statement "don't blame the player, blame the game" is clearly a gross oversimplification. The damage caused by CA forest fires is a complicated multi-factor problem...contributing factors include the weather, PG&E maineance standards, politicians, fire service, and above all a lack of ability to adapt to changing weather conditions. I feel like the public narrative is hindering possible solutions.

You left out one major player: investors. Investor owned utilities like PG&E are considered a rock solid place to put your retirement funds to get a predictable rate of return. As an investor with a short term perspective, I'd be very opposed to PGE reducing or eliminating my dividend in order to fund safety and fire maintenance, i.e. give me the money now, fires be damned. If I'm giving up a dividend, I'd rather invest in a growth stock.

That's likely the force at the root of why there is so much pressure for profit over safety.

The business decisions are optimized for the demands of investors, and the total magnitude of the dividend paid to investors like many of us probably dwarfs the bonuses paid to the execs.

That system was working fine (and in lower fire risk service areas, like most areas east of the Rocky mountains, it still is) until the true unmodeled risks of poor maintenance and climate change finally manifested, and here we are on the other side.

California is a matchbox, and barring major changes in energy generation and distribution technology and infrastructure to lower the risk, it will be risky to deliver electricity here no matter who is providing it, be that PGE or a hypothetical state owned utility. The benefit of the latter is that it is freed from the financial obligation to investors, and can focus on safety and delivery.

It's not just the dividends. It's the $100 million from their safety budget that they blew on executive compensation. There's also the hundreds of millions of dollars annually that PG&E is spending on stock buybacks every year.

It's risky to deliver electricity anywhere. PG&E is reckless and dishonest above and beyond the norm.

> It's not just the dividends. It's the $100 million from their safety budget that they blew on executive compensation. There's also the hundreds of millions of dollars annually that PG&E is spending on stock buybacks.

All of those are ultimately spent for the benefit of investors, whom the executives report to via the board of directors. It doesn't change the argument that PGE's incentive structure is tilted toward their investors' demands first, and safety/ratepayers/public after that.

> It's risky to deliver electricity anywhere.

California is a uniquely risky place compared to elsewhere. It has the combination of a very heavy rainy season, causing massive vegetation growth, followed by a very long dry season. Both are being exacerbated by climate change. On top of that, California has a booming population, with people living in ever more remote fire prone areas, requiring electric transmission lines to those areas.

Areas with year round precipitation don't have nearly the same fire risk.

> PG&E is reckless and dishonest above and beyond the norm.

Perhaps, but that has more to do with answering to investors, and not the underlying physical risks.

And yet it's PG&E that's starting the record breaking fires. It's PG&E that's blowing up neighborhoods. It's PG&E that's poisoning whole towns. As it turns out PG&E is not the only electric utility company in California.

PG&E is doing things in a uniquely wrong manner.

They're not the only electric utility company in California - just the biggest by far. The second biggest is Southern California Edison, who by coincidence happen to have caused what was apparently the second largest wildfire in modern Californian history (Thomas fire in 2017). It sounds like their fire prevention shutoffs haven't been going so well either: https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2019-11-01/southern...

All of the other Californian power companies are much smaller, and I'm not sure they're doing massively better. According to a New York Times article a few months back, the example state officials have pointed to of what PG&E should be doing, San Diego Gas & Electric, only managed to cause "far fewer fires than PG&E" thanks to their own aggressive monitoring and targetted blackouts - which is to say that they're still causing fires - and they're far smaller than PG&E.

Edison settled the lawsuits over the Thomas fire without admitting guilt. To me that seems like a good indication that there was a much less clear case for negligence than there is for PG&E. Guess who started the largest fire…

It sounds like their fire prevention shutoffs haven't been going so well either: https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2019-11-01/southern....

Edison started a fire as they started to turn electricity back on. How many did PG&E start while the power was out? The last count I'd heard was five.

San Diego Gas & Electric, only managed to cause "far fewer fires than PG&E" thanks to their own aggressive monitoring and targetted blackouts - which is to say that they're still causing fires - and they're far smaller than PG&E.

Maybe it's time to shrink PG&E down to a manageable size? I'm not suggesting the other utilities are particularly well behaved, rather PG&E is worse. Take, for instance, fire prevention efforts. Edison disables their automatic reclosers during fire season. PG&E? lol. They're thinking about it.

> Maybe it's time to shrink PG&E down to a manageable size?

You mean shrinking the service area?

If so, some other entity will have to take over distribution in the areas removed from PG&E. It's not like those areas are going to go off-grid.

If those entities are locally owned and controlled (i.e. municipal power, as some CA cities have) it might make those more incentivized to proactively deal with maintenance issues - after all - people don't generally want to endanger their neighbors. But if it's just a slightly smaller investor-owned utility, it's not clear that they'll be incentivized any differently than PG&E is.

And remember that PG&E's size is part of what enabled it to achieve economies of scale, which in turn results in higher profits and dividends for investors.

Finally, even if you shrink PG&E, you still have the problem of maintaining transmission lines, which have been responsible for starting a number of fires. Some entity has to be responsible for maintaining those.

It's the only way to solve a problem when new players are free to enter at any time. (So, this one time things may be different, but it's not a certainty.)

Of course, part of the game rules must be player punishment, otherwise the game is severely broken. But yes, you don't fix anything by focusing on the players.

> the fire services has shown itself not capable of containing the blazes

You realize how large these fires are, right? It is an incredible achievement that they are contained even a little bit. These fires can be so large and burn so hot that they create their own weather patterns over hundreds, even thousands of square miles.

Saying "fire service has show itself not capable of containing" fires is nearly as ignorant as blaming beach life guards for being "incapable of containing a hurricane storm surge"

And yet, that's the job of fire fighters.

Lifeguards don't contain storms...

I beg to differ:

Fire services saved my town just last month when the largest fire in our counties history was set to erase it from the map. They can make a stand where they need to if they have time.

Source: "Inside the fight to save Windsor from the Kincade Fire" [1]

1 - https://www.pressdemocrat.com/news/10278596-181/inside-the-f...

Sonoma County, CA here. Currently under the power shutoff and went through both the Tubbs fire in 2017 and the Kincade fire just last month:

It goes beyond the line maintenance issue - that is really a red herring IMO:

Clearing all fuels X-meters around lines doesn't help when you have hundreds of acres of fuel that hasn't burned in almost 80 years on either side of it, as we do here.

The bigger issue is that California has gradually seen a decrease in controlled burns in these areas.

A controlled burn is a fire set by Cal-Fire/Forestry managers in order to mitigate fuel buildup in fireprone areas.

When I was a kid, it was common to have pretty large controlled burns. My father was involved in setting them up.

Anecdotally, in speaking with him, as more people (reaD: money) moved into the area, there was more and more uproar about controlled burns - eventually they just tailed off because people would be scared, complain about the smoke, nuisance etc.

TL;DR: Maintaining the lines and clearing brush doesn't matter when you have thousands of acres of fuel that hasn't burned in 60-80 years. That is a state/regional management issue. And when you buildup that much potential energy in an area, the laws of thermodynamics tend to take care of it.

Is it a situation in which the state would have to step in and force a controlled burn on a municipality? Are there viable alternatives to controlled burns?

PG&E has not been maintaining equipment. That's the entire crux of the issue. They have been found legally negligent with maintenance.

I'm not sure why people keep pushing this narrative about PG&E doing everything right when it was clear they did many things wrong. They've been found criminally negligent multiple times now on separate occasions.

Companies do not make decisions. People do. So who was criminally negligent?

PG&E, repeatedly, as a decided matter of law, over a period of decades. This isn't even a question. It's a matter of public record.

A charter filed with the state can't make decisions was my point. That, miraculously, no one has really been held liable is a travesty.

I feel like you are confusing the issue here. The law states that they are legally to blame no matter what condition their equipment is in. Therefore it would make sense to temporarily shut down the system.

As to whether or not their equipment caused the large fires is another issue and another discussion altogether.

No, the law has been (and the court case has been linked here before) is that falsifying inspection reports and not actually performing your due diligence in maintaining your power lines and what not opens you up to liability.

The entire reason why they have to shut down their systems is because for years they've been making shit up in order to avoid having to do actual maintenance. And now rather than performing the proper safety inspections and maintenance, they're shutting down the systems due to their prior screwups.

Again I feel like you mis-read my statement. I agree that falsifying inspection reports and not performing maintenance is wrong. I agree that not doing this places PG&E at fault. If you read my comments, I was not arguing against this.

This isn't true. Under California law, PG&E are fully legally liable for any fires caused by their equipment even if they have fully and properly maintained it. This is called "inverse condemnation" and absolutely no negligence is required. (As it happens their maintenance has been rather dubious, but that doesn't affect their legal liability in any way.)

If I remember rightly, the case which set this precedent involved a fuse correctly failing open and managing to set fire to some brush beneath the pole which had grown up in a few months since they'd cleared the entire area around it. There is no maintenance standard they could follow that would protect them from liability; all they can maybe hope to do is decrease the number of fires and the consequent costs somewhat.

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