Site icon 670 AM KIRN – Persian News Talk and Info

PG&E May Proactively Shut Off Power for Safety to Approximately 22,000 Customers Across 17 Counties and 4 Tribal Areas Starting Tuesday Evening

PGE
PGE

 

 

PG&E May Proactively Shut Off Power for Safety to Approximately 22,000 Customers Across 17 Counties and 4 Tribal Areas Starting Tuesday Evening 

 

PG&E Meteorology is monitoring strong winds and dry vegetation conditions late Tuesday through Thursday. PG&E has notified customers, and mitigated impacts to polling locations

 

 

OAKLAND, Calif. — Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) meteorologists and operations professionals continue to monitor a potential wind event forecasted to enter parts of its service area late today (Tuesday, Nov. 5) through Thursday (Nov. 7) morning.

Although recent precipitation has lowered fire potential, fuel conditions have worsened over the last few days under dry and strong winds, leading to elevated fire weather concerns when winds begin strengthen this evening.

Based on these conditions, approximately 22,000 customers are in scope for a potential Public Safety Power Shutoff (PSPS). This is a roughly 7,000 customer increase from earlier estimates due to evolving weather conditions.

PG&E has sent advanced notifications to customers—via text, email, and automated phone call—in targeted areas where power may need to be proactively shut off for safety to reduce wildfire risk. In-scope customers are primarily located in western Sacramento Valley, North Bay and elevated terrain in the East Bay. The duration and extent of power outages will depend on the weather in each area, and not all customers will be affected for the entire period.

Ensuring No Election Day Impact

PG&E has been working with state and local election officials for more than a month to prepare for Election Day.

There are 7,000 Election Day polling locations in PG&E’s service area and 48 tabulation centers. We’ve identified five polling locations in three counties within the PSPS scope. PG&E is staging temporary generation to ensure votes can be cast.

No tabulation centers are currently in the scope of the PSPS.

“We know losing power is disruptive any day of the year, and especially on such an important day as today. We’ve been preparing for Election Day for over a month. We’re taking extraordinary measures to prevent outages at voting and tabulation centers, and pre-staging resources to quickly restore any service outages. Free and fair elections are a hallmark of our democracy, and we’re ready and proud to do our part to ensure that happens,” said Mark Quinlan, PG&E Senior Vice President, Wildfire, Emergency and Operations.

Potentially Affected Customers, Counties

Customers can look up their address online to see if their location is being monitored for the potential PSPS at www.pge.com/pspsupdates.

The potential PSPS event could affect approximately 22,000 customers in portions of these counties:

When possible, PG&E representatives will make individual, in-person visits to customers enrolled in the company’s Medical Baseline Program. These are customers who do not verify they’ve received important safety communications. The primary focus will be on customers who rely on electricity for critical life-sustaining equipment.

Customer Support

 

During PSPS events, PG&E opens Community Resource Centers so community members can access resources, including:

Dozens of Community Resource Centers will be open in impacted counties to provide support to customers between 8 a.m. and 10 p.m. A full list of available CRCs is on pge.com.

Additionally, approximately 1,600 PG&E field personnel are focused on planning and pre-positioning resources for the anticipated event. Nearly 1,500 more are positioned in emergency operations centers around the service area to plan and respond to potential outages.

 

How Customers Can Prepare

 

 

Generator Safety

 

Backup power can be a vital part of any emergency preparedness plan in the event of a power outage. PG&E’s residential and business customers can review key considerations, safety tips, financing and retailer information by visiting pge.com/backuppower.

 

Why PG&E Calls a PSPS Event

PG&E initiates PSPS when the fire-weather forecast is severe enough that people’s safety, lives, homes and businesses may be in danger of wildfires. Our overarching goal is to stop catastrophic wildfires by proactively turning off power in targeted areas when extreme weather threatens our electric grid. We recognize that PSPS outages create hardships for our customers and communities. Our sole focus is to keep our customers safe.

As each weather situation is unique, we carefully review a combination of factors when deciding if power must be turned off. These factors include but are not limited to:

Our decision-making process also accounts for the presence of trees tall enough to strike powerlines. This set of criteria is a first step which may lead to further analysis by our meteorology team to determine if a PSPS event is necessary.

Where to Learn More

From: Chan, Fiona <FxCm@pge.com>
Sent: Monday, November 4, 2024 5:12 PM
To: Chan, Fiona <FxCm@pge.com>
Subject: PSPS UPDATE: PSPS Scope Changes to Impact 20,142 customers in 17 counties

Dear Media Partners:

PG&E’s machine learning wind models are showing the potential for gusts greater than 50 mph over elevated terrain in the North and East Bay with windiest spots in the Geysers, Mt. St Helena, and Mt. Diablo reaching near or above 70 mph. With humidity dropping to 15-30% in windy areas, fire risk will increase under the strong and dry winds. The criteria for calling a PSPS event—low relative humidity, diminished moisture of vegetation and gusting wind conditions— are forecasted to be met on Tuesday night.

Given these conditions, PG&E activated its Emergency Operations Center (EOC). As of 3 pm on Monday, 11/4, 20,142 customers in 17 counties and 4 tribal areas are in scope for this PSPS event. Of the ~20,000 customers in scope, they are primarily located in in Western Sacramento Valley, North Bay and Elevated terrain in the East Bay.

Please see below the potential scope of this PSPS event:

County Estimated Customers Impacted
ALAMEDA 540
BUTTE 292
COLUSA 607
CONTRA COSTA 1372
GLENN 510
KERN 586
LAKE 1160
MENDOCINO 13
NAPA 4636
PLUMAS 3
SANTA CLARA 1490
SANTA CRUZ 325
SOLANO 5491
SONOMA 1581
STANISLAUS 27
TEHAMA 1075
YOLO 434

Tribal Counties:

Tribe County Estimated Customers Impacted
Cortina Rancheria COLUSA 8
Grindstone Rancheria GLENN 46
Middletown Rancheria LAKE 33
Yocha Dehe Wintun Nation YOLO 4

Customers in the affected areas have been notified via email, phone call or text to help them prepare for power outages.  Visit PG&E’s Outage Center to see if your county or home address falls within the affected areas. This website is available in 16 languages including English.