California Claims PG&E Falsified Gas Safety Records
December 14 2018 - 7:38PM
Dow Jones News
By Katherine Blunt
PG&E Corp. falsified natural gas pipeline-safety records
over a five-year period ending in 2017, California regulators said
Friday, dealing another blow to the state's largest utility as it
struggles to deal with mounting lawsuits blaming it for devastating
wildfires.
The California Public Utilities Commission said an investigation
by its safety division found that PG&E lacked sufficient
staffing to locate and mark natural-gas pipelines as required by
law, and pressured employees to complete the work. As a result, the
agency alleged, PG&E staff falsified some of those records.
The commission directed PG&E to take "immediate corrective
measures" and opened a proceeding to consider penalties against the
company.
"Utility falsification of safety related records is a serious
violation of law and diminishes our trust in the utility's reports
on their progress," CPUC President Michael Picker said in a
statement. "These findings are another example of why we are
investigating PG&E's safety culture."
PG&E didn't immediately respond to a request for comment
Friday.
The CPUC last month expanded a continuing probe of PG&E's
safety practices and said it would explore the way the company is
structured and managed.
The commission began the investigation of the company's safety
culture three years ago, after a devastating natural-gas pipeline
explosion in 2010 killed eight people and caused widespread damage
in San Bruno, Calif. The company was fined $1.6 billion by state
regulators in connection with that incident. It was also fined $3
million by a federal judge and is on federal probation as a
result.
PG&E shares have fallen sharply in recent weeks after the
company disclosed that some of its equipment malfunctioned in the
area of last month's Camp Fire, minutes before the fire was
reported. The Camp Fire killed at least 86 people and destroyed
about 14,000 homes, making it the state's deadliest fire ever.
The utility released new information this week indicating that
one of its power lines near where the Camp Fire started Nov. 8 came
apart immediately beforehand and fell from the metal tower that
held it aloft.
Investigators, who are still trying to determine the cause of
the fire, removed some utility equipment from the tower and from
another line with broken power poles for closer analysis.
PG&E asked state regulators on Thursday to approve a plan to
sharply increase revenue a three-year period, with a rate increase
on customers of 12%, or $1.1 billion, in 2020 that would rise to
24%, or over $2 billion a year, by 2022.
The company said the request reflected anticipated additional
spending on wildfire mitigation and insurance costs, but didn't
include the largest potential expenses it faces: liability from
lawsuits alleging it is to blame for wildfires in recent years.
Experts have estimated those liability costs could run into the
tens of billions of dollars.
While state fire investigators haven't determined whether
PG&E equipment was to blame for the Camp Fire or the Tubbs Fire
-- the deadliest of 2017 -- they have found PG&E responsible
for 17 major fires in 2017 that destroyed 3,256 structures and
killed 22 people. Eleven of those cases have been referred to
county district attorneys for possible criminal charges against the
utility.
Write to Katherine Blunt at Katherine.Blunt@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
December 14, 2018 19:23 ET (00:23 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2018 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
PG&E (NYSE:PCG)
Historical Stock Chart
From Mar 2024 to Apr 2024
PG&E (NYSE:PCG)
Historical Stock Chart
From Apr 2023 to Apr 2024