The Right Target

The once-golden state of California has a giant black eye right now. The seasonal winds and low humidity have elevated the fire danger to the point where drastic preventive measures seem necessary to protect lives and property, like PG&E’s massive Northern California power shut-off. It was a mess.

At its San Francisco headquarters, the utility put up barricades around the building to shield its corporate personnel from angry customers. But that didn’t protect company field workers. In one case, a PG&E truck driver was shot at – fortunately, not hurt.

Not only was that expression of anger inappropriate; the PG&E line personnel shouldn’t be the ones targeted. But the utility’s spotty track record has exposed the company to crippling legal liability.

We did not lose power at our house, but we were expecting an extreme wind event, which didn’t live up to its billing in all areas. PG&E’s customer communication system generally failed, and even the shut-off itself was haphazard, as was the restoration of power. PG&E tried to comfort us all by talking about the disaster that didn’t happen - a hard sell to those with refrigerators full of spoiled food.

It’s fashionable to hate PG&E and to rail against the investor-owned-utility model for its apparent focus on profits over forward-thinking. But does that mean a government-run operation would necessarily be better? You can blame PG&E for not maintaining every single inch of power line through every rural acre of an enormous part of this state. You might also blame the local governments that allowed people to build  in certain areas, and those who chose to live there.

The blame game, though, has done nothing but divide us into victims and perpetrators, or plaintiffs and defendants. But where do we go from here? If there’s a bright side, the shutoff was good disaster training, and could spur the drive toward a sustainable electric power system to face climate change.

Microgrids are one potential solution, but progress can start at the individual homeowner level right now. If you can afford it, don’t just put solar panels on the roof. Pay the extra money and have your solar installer connect them to a battery storage system that can power the house whenever commercial electricity is cut. Batteries will only get better with time, and someday, homes may be self-sufficient, power-wise.

We can either submit to a depressing “new normal,” or we can start to shape it. We may have to be dragged into the latter kicking and screaming, but we will get there.