PG&E is currently charging 4-7x the national average rate, with CPUC approval. [0] And, even if reimbursement for long-overdue safety improvement is a reasonable idea, the way they’re approaching it is absurd.
As an example, there’s a technology called, variously, “rapid earth fault clearance” or a “ground fault neutralizer”. It’s a device at a station that massively reduces the amount of energy delivered into a downstream ground fault (e.g. downed power line hitting dry vegetation). California is uniquely suited to deployment of these devices because CA is the only state that bans the practice of using a neutral conductor that’s grounded along the utility poles (and thus produces a residual current even without a fault if the loads are unbalanced between the phases).
The recent PG&E “rate case” in which PG&E got permission to yet again raise rates despite already being hilariously expensive gas PG&E spending ludicrous amounts of money on poles and vegetation management and installing a whopping two REFCL devices per year.
For context, a fire-prone region of Australia tested these devices a few years ago by intentionally dropping a protected, energized conductor into a box of dry plants, and they didn’t catch fire. The protection worked.
[0] In the state that created Tesla, it’s not actually especially economical to drive one if you live in PG&E territory. This is pathetic.
I mean that's strictly not true. PG&E's spend has to be approved by a regulator who in the past has not approved capital expenses.
> When PG&E suggested inspecting 300,000 poles a year to ensure safety in 2012, CPUC cut the total to 235,000.¹¹ In 2011 and 2012, when PG&E spent almost $100 million more on replacing poles than allowed by CPUC, the regulator took that as a reason to deny future claims for pole replacement spending. It said “PG&E demonstrated the capacity and willingness to spend more than previously authorized…to meet service obligations,” thus they would not include extra required pole replacements in the “rate base.” These sorts of decisions created exactly the wrong incentives, penalizing PG&E for doing more than was required.¹²
https://ciceroinstitute.org/pge-failing-california/