High Winds, Drought Conditions Mean PG&E May Need to Proactively Turn Off Power for Safety Tuesday through Wednesday Afternoon in Small Parts of 18 Counties
August 16 2021 - 10:23PM
Business Wire
PG&E Is Sending One-Day Notifications to
About 48,000 Customers Who Might Experience a Public Safety Power
Shutoff
Potential Safety Shutoffs May Last Through an
All-Clear Wednesday Afternoon, Will Mostly Affect Butte and Shasta
Counties
Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) continues to monitor
a dry offshore wind event forecasted to start Tuesday night (August
17). As a result of this wind event, combined with extreme to
exceptional drought conditions and extremely dry vegetation,
PG&E began sending one-day advance notifications Monday
afternoon to customers in areas where PG&E may need to
proactively turn off power for safety to reduce the risk of
wildfire from energized power lines.
The potential Public Safety Power Shutoff (PSPS) event, starting
Tuesday evening and forecasted to last through Wednesday afternoon,
could affect about 48,000 customers in small portions of 18
counties in the Sierra Nevada foothills, the North Coast, the North
Valley and the North Bay mountains.
PG&E meteorologists are tracking a weather system in those
areas that could bring sustained winds of up to 40 mph, gusting
higher in foothills and mountains. The National Weather Service
issued Fire Weather Watches in the areas Tuesday through Wednesday
based on forecasts for dry, northerly winds and low relative
humidity. In addition, the Northern California Geographic Area
Coordination Center’s North Operations Predictive Services issued a
high-risk fire warning Tuesday through Wednesday due to “an
unusually gusty early-season” wind event.
While most of the affected customers—approximately 31,000—are in
Butte and Shasta counties, we are also notifying customers in small
portions of 16 other counties: Colusa, Glenn, Humboldt, Lake,
Lassen, Mendocino, Napa, Nevada, Plumas, Sierra, Solano, Sonoma,
Tehama, Trinity, Yolo and Yuba.
The potential PSPS event is still about 24 hours away.
PG&E’s in-house meteorologists, its Wildfire Safety Operations
Center and its Emergency Operations Center continue to monitor
conditions closely. We will share additional customer notifications
as conditions evolve.
Customer notifications via text, email and automated phone call
began Sunday night, two days prior to the potential shutoff.
PG&E employees will pay individual, in-person visits when
possible to customers enrolled in the company’s Medical Baseline
program who do not verify that they have received these important
safety communications, with a primary focus on customers who rely
on electricity for critical life-sustaining equipment.
Potentially Affected Counties
Customers can look up their address at www.pge.com/pspsupdates
to see if PG&E is monitoring their location for the potential
safety shutoff.
The potential shutoff is expected to affect approximately 48,000
customers in these counties:
- Butte County: 11,114 customers, 1,027 Medical Baseline
customers
- Colusa County: 509 customers, 33 Medical Baseline
customers
- Glenn County: 207 customers, 10 Medical Baseline
customers
- Humboldt County: 681 customers, 16 Medical Baseline
customers
- Lake County: 2,083 customers, 136 Medical Baseline
customers
- Lassen County: 65 customers, 7 Medical Baseline
customers
- Mendocino County: 669 customers, 30 Medical Baseline
customers
- Napa County: 2,041 customers, 99 Medical Baseline
customers
- Nevada County: 133 customers, 3 Medical Baseline
customers
- Plumas County: 660 customers, 24 Medical Baseline
customers
- Shasta County: 19,999 customers, 1,713 Medical Baseline
customers
- Sierra County: 1,036 customers, 30 Medical Baseline
customers
- Solano County: 44 customers, 0 Medical Baseline
customers
- Sonoma County: 240 customers, 9 Medical Baseline
customer
- Tehama County: 7,473 customers, 671 Medical Baseline
customers
- Trinity County: 428 customers, 21 Medical Baseline
customers
- Yolo County: 11 customers, 0 Medical Baseline
customers
- Yuba County: 487 customers, 47 Medical Baseline
customers
Why PG&E Calls a PSPS
Event
The sole purpose of a PSPS is to reduce the risk of major
wildfires during severe weather. While a PSPS is an important
wildfire safety tool, PG&E understands that losing power
disrupts lives.
We initiate a PSPS event when the weather forecast is for such
severe weather that people’s safety, lives, homes and businesses
may be in danger of wildfires.
As each weather situation is unique, we carefully review a
combination of factors when deciding if power must be turned off.
These factors include:
- Low humidity levels, generally 30% and below.
- A forecast of high winds, particularly sustained winds above 20
miles per hour and wind gusts above 30-40 miles per hour.
- Condition of dry material on the ground and low moisture
content of vegetation.
- A Red Flag Warning declared by the National Weather
Service.
- Real-time ground observations from our Wildfire Safety
Operations Center and from our crews working across the service
territory.
This year, our decision-making process is evolving to also
account for the presence of trees tall enough to strike power lines
when determining if a PSPS event is necessary.
Every wildfire season is different, and the ongoing drought and
the conditions will determine the number of times we will need to
shut off power, without compromising safety.
This set of criteria is a first step which may lead to further
analysis from our meteorology team to determine if a PSPS event is
necessary.
Here’s Where to Learn
More
- PG&E’s emergency website (www.pge.com/pspsupdates) is now
available in 16 languages: English, Spanish, Chinese, Tagalog,
Russian, Vietnamese, Korean, Farsi, Arabic, Hmong, Khmer, Punjabi,
Japanese, Thai, Portuguese and Hindi. Customers will have the
opportunity to choose their language of preference for viewing the
information when visiting the website.
- Customers are encouraged to update their contact information
and indicate their preferred language for notifications by visiting
www.pge.com/mywildfirealerts or by calling 1-800-742-5000, where
in-language support is available.
- Tenants and non-account holders can sign up to receive PSPS ZIP
Code Alerts for any area where you do not have a PG&E account
by visiting www.pge.com/pspszipcodealerts.
- At PG&E’s Safety Action Center
(www.safetyactioncenter.pge.com) customers can prepare for
emergencies. By using the "Make Your Own Emergency Plan" tool and
answering a few short questions, visitors to the website can
compile and organize the important information needed for a
personalized family emergency plan. This includes phone numbers,
escape routes and a family meeting location if an evacuation is
necessary.
PG&E's Commitment to Wildfire
Safety
PG&E's multi-faceted Community Wildfire Safety Program
includes both immediate and long-term action plans to further
reduce wildfire risk and keep its customers and communities safe.
Since 2018, PG&E's wildfire safety work has resulted in:
- Multiple inspections of distribution, transmission and
substation equipment in high fire-threat areas
- Hardening more than 600 miles with stronger lines and poles to
better withstand severe weather
- Conducting enhanced vegetation safety work on nearly 5,000 line
miles in high fire-threat areas (this is in addition to the more
than 5 million trees that PG&E has trimmed or removed as part
of its routine vegetation management and tree mortality
efforts)
- Installing more than 1,000 sectionalizing devices and switches
that limit the size of Public Safety Power Shutoffs (PSPS) that are
necessary to mitigate the risk of wildfires
- Installing more than 1,150 advanced weather stations to help
PG&E gather more data and information to better predict and
respond to extreme weather threats
- Installing more than 400 high-definition cameras to monitor and
respond to wildfires
- Reserving more than 65 helicopters to quickly restore power
after severe weather during PSPS events
- Monitoring wildfire threats in real-time through a dedicated
team at PG&E's Wildfire Safety Operations Center, which is
staffed 24 hours a day during wildfire season
Ongoing PG&E Wildfire Mitigation and
Resiliency Efforts
In addition to significantly expanding its undergrounding,
PG&E's ongoing safety work to enhance grid resilience and
address the growing threat of severe weather and wildfires
continues on a risk-based and data-driven basis, as outlined in
PG&E's 2021 Wildfire Mitigation Plan.
About PG&E
Pacific Gas and Electric Company, a subsidiary of PG&E
Corporation (NYSE:PCG), is a combined natural gas and electric
utility serving more than 16 million people across 70,000 square
miles in Northern and Central California. For more information,
visit pge.com and pge.com/news.
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