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California’s top utility regulator may force Pacific Gas and Electric Co. to submit to a stricter oversight process that could ultimately result in the company losing its license and being taken over by the state.
Marybel Batjer, president of the California Public Utilities Commission, told PG&E in a letter Tuesday that her agency was investigating whether it must crack down on the company because of wildfire safety concerns.
Batjer said the commission’s staff was weighing whether to place PG&E into a sixstep process of escalating enforcement that was created when the company exited bankruptcy this year. The most extreme end of the six steps could have the commission revoke PG&E’s operating license, and if that happens, the state of California may seize control of the company.
But it’s not yet clear whether the commission’s oversight actions, if taken, would come anywhere close to that most severe step.
Batjer’s letter said the commission’s “factfinding activities are well underway and are being undertaken expeditiously.”
“My concerns arose from what appears to be a pattern of vegetation and asset management
deficiencies that implicate PG&E’s ability to provide safe, reliable service to customers,” she said in a letter to Bill Smith, interim CEO of the parent company PG&E Corp.
Batjer said that staff in the commission’s Wildfire Safety Division had observed a “volume and rate of defects” in PG&E’s treetrimming program “that is noticeably higher than those observed for the other utilities.” Commission officials are also reviewing relevant court filings in the company’s criminal probation case, she said.
PG&E’s bankruptcy was prompted by its responsibility for a multiyear string of devastating wildfires that killed dozens of people and destroyed thousands of homes. When the commission approved PG&E’s plan to resolve the bankruptcy case, it also created the new enforcement process to provide more concrete steps that regulators could take if the company failed to clean up its act.
Aside from a possible license revocation, the new regulatory process includes lesssevere steps such as enhanced reporting, stronger oversight of operations and the appointment of new officials to oversee the company.
Terrie Prosper, a spokesperson for the utilities commission, said in an email that Batjer’s comment on the sixstep oversight process was “a generic reference” that encompassed the full range of possible outcomes. The letter is not intended to “indicate a specific step” before commission staff make a recommendation, she said.
“PG&E does not have to go through the steps in order and can be placed in any step of the trigger as appropriate to the situation,” Prosper said in the email.
In an emailed statement, PG&E spokesman James Noonan said the company was focused on safety but officials “know we have more to do, and we are committed to doing it the right way.” He touted PG&E’s progress on its wildfire safety plan this year and said the company was working to address problems raised by the commission’s fire safety staff.
“We recognize the issues that have been raised and we are listening to this feedback and taking it seriously,” Noonan said in the email.
“We agree that, when it comes to safety, there is always more that can be done.”
PG&E has a new CEO, Patti Poppe, who is set to take the reins of the parent company in January.