I guess it is Official... Northern California cannot keep the utility power on in sunny/warm weather

BB.

Well, it looks like that Northern and Central California will have power shutdowns because of hot/dry weather and possible higher winds.

The plans are to start shutdowns at 12:01 AM Wednesday Morning and continue through about noon Wednesday (a bit unclear exactly when). Winds are supposed to pickup some tonight and Wednesday (around mountain peaks). Sonoma, Napa, Calistoga are probably where the "worst" potential fire conditions will exist through upwards of 5 days.

The total power shutdown is planned to be 3-5 days. Note that PG&E (our utility) plans on 24 to 48 hours to restart the lines (they want to examine every mile of shutdown transmission and distribution lines. I guess that more remote areas will be closer to 48 hours.

The regions are mostly high valleys and hills with lots of dry brush and woodlands. Generally does not apply to major cities/built up areas.

This is nuts...

https://www.sfgate.com/california-wildfires/article/PG-E-power-shutoff-napa-length-five-days-sonoma-14499478.php

Right now, the PG&E outage website is down/hanging more than it is up.

I wonder how may generator deaths (CO and Fires) there will be? In the middle of a city, with nobody prepared--We will see...

-Bill

Marc Kurth

I will refrain from openly sharing all my feelings about the obvious problems on display, and why PG&E is forced to deal with it this way.

But I will say that after living in California from 1955 until 2008, I had a deep seated love for the state and all that it offered.

I moved to Texas and that turned out to be great decision. In many ways, TX is similar to what CA was. But then, home is where you make it!

Estragon

If 800,000 people are actually affected by long outages, it stands to reason some (more) political games may ensue.

mike95490

please give us power for our beer coolers ,  and  we'll forgive you for BBQ'ing several towns in the past. 

And please, enjoy the   $11 million bonus dollars  - good job deferring all the maintenance for the last 40 years.

https://www.sfchronicle.com/business/article/PG-E-plans-nearly-11-million-in-executive-bonuses-14025497.php

Aguarancher

Congrats Liberals, you have achieved your goal. California has officially made it to 3rd world status..

Dave Angelini

Aguarancher said:

Congrats Liberals, you have achieved your goal. California has officially made it to 3rd world status..

That is not true, we have been there for quite some time now. This did not happen recently and PG & E is just doing what is prudent. This is a state that has rejected common sense for decades.

The Utilities are doing what they can because they can't control the wind, they can't control the ridiculous polices that have allowed the fuel load to increase immensely. All they can do is control the ignition source. In my opinion. Born and raised here.

 Basic fire science. Weather, Fuel source, Ignition source.

Aguarancher

"Born and raised here."

4th Gen Native here. Any yes the liberal policies over the past 50 yrs. have brought us to this. The foresters tried to tell them, both state and federal policies were setting the state up for this current boondoggle.. Sadly it fell on deft ears..

Dave Angelini

Some is deaf ears, most is a one party state that was bought and paid to be deaf. Really funny hearing how outraged Gavin (governor) is. 

Funny for me offgrid with a major wildfire 3 miles away because I am prepared for it and helping as many as I can to be also. Yellow circle is home about 3 miles upwind. Power out up there for days notw in the Briceburg fire. Steep canyons that make their own winds.

The pendulum is swinging to undo the damage but at what cost?

BB.

And nobody has planned for this... CalTrans (California department of transportation) is struggling to install emergency generators on a couple of major tunnels--Otherwise, they were going to just shut them down:

https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Caldecott-Tom-Lantos-tunnel-to-close-PGE-shutoff-14502496.php

"We & @CaltransD4 are preparing for full closures of the Caldecott Tunnel in @CCCounty & @AlamedaCounty on SR 24 & the Tom Lantos Tunnel along SR 1 in @Pacifica as soon as this evening, due to the @PGE4Me Public Safety Power Shutoff #PSPS. The tunnels can't operate without power," the agency said in a tweet.

The Caldecott tunnel is a MAJOR East Bay commute corridor.

I resisted say this here when making the opening post, but... California is becoming Venezuela. And the folks in Venezuela voted for their government too.

https://duckduckgo.com/?q=california+is+becoming+venezuela

I think "the powers that be" are punishing us for not being onboard with the little people being governed by the elite. Or they are simply incompetent. Of course, there is the healing power of "and".

-Bill  "I did not vote for any of them" B.

Dave Angelini

A little of both incompetence and politics. I hear there will be gensets for all   We have hashed this out here ad nauseum. Same story different year.....

As for planning, I know when we lived in the San Jose 28 years ago there was triage planning for medical earthquake disasters and at HP Santa Clara we had 2 large generators. The hospitals all had them too but I have no idea what it is like up there now. 

In a way this may be a good thing for people in the cities. Hard to say on that one. Good Luck!

BB.

PG&E and the State Government/Public Utility Commision:

-Bill

Dave Angelini

Nice Comrad...hee hee. Love the eye patch. reminds me of Dr Strangelove. The guy in the long leather coat also.

Might be able to go outdoors if the wind blows the smoke out. had to wait until 3 pm yesterday. October inversions are nasty. Planes can't fly low either.
https://twitter.com/hashtag/briceburgfire?src=hash

Screen below is the wind now. Going to howl tonight.

softdown

BB showing some angst. Oh my - did not see that coming. 

westbranch

They need to tell the people Smokey died a few years ago as he was old and too effective in brainwashing too many people about wildfires.....

(ps I am a retired Forester)

R.I.P. Smokey

On August 9, 1944, the creation of Smokey Bear was authorized by the Forest Service, and the first poster was delivered on October 10 by artist Albert Staehle. The poster depicted a bear pouring a bucket of water on a campfire. Smokey Bear soon became popular, and his image began appearing on more posters and cards.

About the Campaign | Smokey Bear

https://smokeybear.com › smokeys-history › about-the-campaign

Dave Angelini

Cool on Smokey! He is still used here in the Yosemite region BTW Eric.

Some of my favorite folk to have a beer with are the Forestry, Fire, and Sheriff/CHP who support us living out in the middle of nowhere.

https://www.yourcentralvalley.com/news/local-news/mariposa-residents-react-to-challenging-briceburg-fire/

Some progress is that this is the first year that California has a budget for prescribed burns, fire breaks, and hardening of towns.
Before it was in the fire budget and every year that would get depleted and there was nothing left for prevention.

On this fire they are working with reducing the risk next time, I am told. You can see below they are hitting this hard with resources.

mike95490

Soon, the cities will be at the point of demanding the power be left on, and "sacrificing a town somewhere" to the fire gods annually. Loosing power for 4 days for a 12hr wind event, is a game changing thing that folks did not realize.   The powerline inspections to restore power can only be done in daylight

Marc Kurth

mike95490 said:

Soon, the cities will be at the point of demanding the power be left on, and "sacrificing a town somewhere" to the fire gods annually. Loosing power for 4 days for a 12hr wind event, is a game changing thing that folks did not realize.   The powerline inspections to restore power can only be done in daylight

The utility companies are counting on it.

MrM1

So, intended consequences? 

westbranch

this is a copy of another  writer.... sympathetic?....

John Pearley Huffman, Car and Driver:

Weeks can be a long wait if you’re looking at a Model 3 in your garage with a drained battery, no electrical power to charge it, and the closest grocery store with power 80 miles away. But such is life in the Golden State, where forests and chaparral are all on hair triggers ready to ignite with slightest transformer malfunction or transmission line break. And the political environment demands minimal risk after the 2018 fire season produced 8527 conflagrations burning an astonishing 1,893,913 acres of wild lands and more than 18,000 structures...

California is experimenting with its power-generation future. And right now, that experiment is hurting. Particularly those electric-car owners with dead batteries.

softdown

westbranch said:

this is a copy of another  writer.... sympathetic?....

John Pearley Huffman, Car and Driver:

Weeks can be a long wait if you’re looking at a Model 3 in your garage with a drained battery, no electrical power to charge it, and the closest grocery store with power 80 miles away. But such is life in the Golden State, where forests and chaparral are all on hair triggers ready to ignite with slightest transformer malfunction or transmission line break. And the political environment demands minimal risk after the 2018 fire season produced 8527 conflagrations burning an astonishing 1,893,913 acres of wild lands and more than 18,000 structures...

California is experimenting with its power-generation future. And right now, that experiment is hurting. Particularly those electric-car owners with dead batteries.

Another citizen detached from reality. Multi day power outages cause far bigger problems than dead batteries in your Tesla.

"8527 conflagrations burning an astonishing 1,893,913 acres of wild lands and more than 18,000 structures." Well, exaggeration seems to be the norm these days. 

Dave Angelini

A casual search of lawsuits in the last 30 days found 4 stopping PG & E from clearing the brush under their power poles. Meanwhile our Governor Gruesome says the utility is greedy.

The Sierra forest that is burning 3 miles from here use to have about 60 trees per acre and now is between 800 and 1200 trees. It will be a moonscape and take 10 years to try to recover what use to come back in a year or so.

You don't have to have a background in forestry to get the feeling some of the lights are on but nobody's home.

softdown

Dave Angelini said:

A casual search of lawsuits in the last 30 days found 4 stopping PG & E from clearing the brush under their power poles. Meanwhile our Governor Gruesome says the utility is greedy.

The Sierra forest that is burning 3 miles from here use to have about 60 trees per acre and now is between 800 and 1200 trees. It will be a moonscape and take 10 years to try to recover what use to come back in a year or so.

You don't have to have a background in forestry to get the feeling some of the lights are on but nobody's home.

Another way of saying that they are detached from reality I think. Here is a real consequence of power outages: https://www.foxnews.com/us/oxygen-dependent-man-dies-12-minutes-after-pge-cuts-power-to-his-home

Your governor seems to be full of cow poop....or BS.....whatever you prefer, he is full of it. 

Estragon

Curious, who has standing to bring a suit against brush clearing?  Private owners of land in rights of way? Gov't in protecting endangered species?

It seems to me a >10x increase in tree density would make for a very different forest in terms of tree and other species habitat.

Dave Angelini

One suit was city of Santa Cruz and another was San Jose.
The other funny thing is the Gov wants to ban natural gas and 4 cities have already.

Gas is 1/3 to heat with but it is not "mother earth" and with an all electric house you will be so green. Even greener when the grid goes down

The Governor and his 2 predecessors are the ones who appoint the PUC who negotiate with the utility. If the utility is greedy it is because they know how to keep it all going with crazy people at the helm. Garbage in / garbage out, on autopilot.

bill von novak

Dave Angelini said:

Some is deaf ears, most is a one party state that was bought and paid to be deaf.

Not really.  This is the result of a pretty simple dynamic.

1) Power is kept on during Red Flag events.  Fires start; property and lives are lost.  Homeowners sue the utility into oblivion.
2) Power is shut down during Red Flag events.  People are unhappy; business is lost.  Homeowners (and businesses) sue the utility into oblivion.

Continue forever - and with a bigger swing every time.  Not only is the climate going to keep warming, people will feel more and more entitled to both their safety and their power.  At least the lawyers will make money.

Dave Angelini

3)  The environmental movement/State stopped most all of the usual ways of maintaining a healthy forest and 39 million people are here now. Many have moved out into the forested areas because the state has ruined the housing industry. The only affordable housing is in poor rural counties.

We are building $525K single person dwellings for "homeless" in Los Angeles and  it is not just the Lawyers but all involved are taking their cut every step of the way. They should be in tents away from people doing business and raising their children.

Global warming/cooling has very little to do with this huge problem. The Utility says it will take 5 more years of outages for them to do all of the repairs. Many folks will just go east to avoid living in a third world US state.

bill von novak

Dave Angelini said:

3)  The environmental movement/State stopped most all of the usual ways of maintaining a healthy forest and 39 million people are here now. Many have moved out into the forested areas because the state has ruined the housing industry. The only affordable housing is in poor rural counties.

We are building $525K single person dwellings for "homeless" in Los Angeles and  it is not just the Lawyers but all involved are taking their cut every step of the way. They should be in tents away from people doing business and raising their children.

They should be.  Then the city passes a law against living in tents because someone doesn't like seeing them.   That just happened in San Diego.

Climate change has a huge effect on this problem.  Wildfires have risen dramatically over the past 40 years or so.  Between 1986 and 2003, wildfires happened four times as often, burned six times the land area, and lasted five times as long vs. from 1970 and 1986 in the western US.  So even if we do nothing, wildfires will continue to get worse.  Unfortunately, we are currently making the problem worse, with bankrupt utilities looking to get through the next two months, rather than the next two (or ten) years.

Many folks will just go east to avoid living in a third world US state.

That would be great.  Lower housing prices, less water use, less traffic, less pollution.

softdown

Yea - except they tend to take their Californicated politics where they go. They never learn. 

Dave Angelini

I have 5 more years or so to try and convince/sway voters and I want this state to ge great because I was born here. There is a point of no return and even though I would hate to leave the Sierra where my family came from I will. 

Man (PUC) negotiated all the the contracts with the Utility and the PUC is appointed by the Governor. The blame lays right on this one party state that has a pendulum that fails to swing anymore. 

The problems are man made in California. There are plenty of reasons but they are quite a ways down on a Pareto diagram.

Cal Fire is actually making some progress on using fire intelligently but the money needed is paying for the 50% of the US Bums and Junkies who live here. It is not sustainable.

 There are more coming! We have the sunshine and the girls all get so tan😎

softdown

Dave Angelini said:

I have 5 more years or so to try and convince/sway voters and I want this state to ge great because I was born here. There is a point of no return and even though I would hate to leave the Sierra where my family came from I will. 

Man (PUC) negotiated all the the contracts with the Utility and the PUC is appointed by the Governor. The blame lays right on this one party state that has a pendulum that fails to swing anymore. 

The problems are man made in California. There are plenty of reasons but they are quite a ways down on a Pareto diagram.

Cal Fire is actually making some progress on using fire intelligently but the money needed is paying for the 50% of the US Bums and Junkies who live here. It is not sustainable.

 There are more coming! We have the sunshine and the girls all get so tan😎

Your state does have the womenz. That can not be argued. Florida can compete a little. 

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7oRb9-mypxg

mike95490

Dave Angelini said:

  {  chart }

..........Man (PUC) negotiated all the the contracts with the Utility and the PUC is appointed by the Governor. The blame lays right on this one party state that has a pendulum that fails to swing anymore. ............

Dave, what is your source for that fuel load chart ?   I'd like to use it, but need it's pedigree, because I know someone will call me on it.