PG&E Lays Off Inspectors, Tree Trimmers Ahead of Winter Wildfire Maintenance

This story was initially printed by Grist. You can subscribe to its weekly newsletter here.

Pacific Gas & Electric, California’s non-public utility firm that maintains a monopoly over electrical service within the state, let go of hundreds of contractors and staff throughout a number of trades over the past month.

Union leaders advised members that the layoffs had been on account of overspending, and that as Pacific Gas & Electric, or PG&E, overruns its price range in direction of the top of the yr, the corporate determined to push again fourth-quarter work into the brand new yr.

Workers let go embrace vegetation administration inspectors, tree trimmers, electrical linesmen, and pole testers — all work that’s essential to wildfire mitigation.

“[We] do annual maintenance to ensure fire safety and have deadlines to get it done,” mentioned Marisa Evans, a vegetation administration inspector within the north Bay Area. “By pushing back fourth-quarter work, [the crews] are falling behind one to two months.” The delay may very well be expensive: Winter is often the best time to prune trees, when cracks and deadwood are extra seen and bushes should not actively rising.

According to stories from the state’s Office of Energy Infrastructure Safety, PG&E is already far behind on work orders for line upkeep. “That’s a major safety concern,” mentioned Mark Toney, government director of TURN, a utility ratepayer advocacy group, including, “I keep getting calls from hospitals and housing projects that can’t get connected to the grid.”

The non-public utility, one of many largest within the nation, has performed a infamous position in sparking a few of the largest fires within the state, together with the Dixie Fire in 2021 and the Camp Fire in 2018, the deadliest hearth in California historical past. In 2019, PG&E filed for chapter after asserting a $13.5 billion settlement with California wildfire victims. In April of final yr, it was put under a period of “enhanced oversight and enforcement” by the California Public Utilities Commission on account of issues that PG&E wasn’t clearing bushes away from energy strains quick sufficient, elevating the danger of fallen branches sparking one other hearth. But the fee voted to carry the probation final week, saying that the corporate had made progress.

“They should be moved up the ladder of probation,” not have their restrictions eliminated, mentioned Toney. “They keep causing fires and failing inspections.”

The International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers 1245, or IBEW 1245, the union that represents PG&E employees, supplied no touch upon the layoffs. But employees who attended a union assembly on Thursday mentioned leaders referenced the job losses as “large and unprecedented,” mentioned that employees laid off throughout crafts numbered within the hundreds, and that selections had been being made by PG&E higher administration due to price range constraints.

The utility has been at work burying, or undergrounding, 10,000 miles of overhead energy strains in high-fire threat districts as a part of its wildfire mitigation plan, a labor intensive and expensive enterprise that can value an estimated $25 billion.

Toney and different price payer advocates have criticized the initiative as a method for the utility to spend money on capital tasks that enhance shareholder returns whereas neglecting the work that’s actually wanted. “I am concerned that they are diverting money from basic operations, maintenance, and repairs and putting it into undergrounding and other capital projects that create profit,” mentioned Toney. He added, “It’s hard to understand how they’re running out of cash with these double digit rate increases,” referring to the utility’s proposal to hike rates by about 20 percent in 2023, after the same bounce in 2022.

In an announcement to Grist, PG&E mentioned that the corporate was chopping again contractors based mostly on the quantity of labor that must be executed and that they sometimes use contractors as a versatile useful resource that they ramp down on the finish of the yr.

“Overall, we have reduced the number of contractors working for PG&E in recent weeks due to several factors, including completing or nearly completing the 2022 work plans these contractors had supported,” mentioned PG&E spokesperson Matt Nauman. He additionally mentioned that snow within the mountains has induced some work to cease for the season and that PG&E is trying to deliver extra of its tree work in-house by hiring 150 vegetation administration inspectors as staff. Currently nearly all of the tree work is finished by contractors.

The crews have been advised they will seemingly anticipate to return to work in January and February, however based on Zac Knittle, a vegetation administration contractor who was current on the union assembly on Thursday, “many groups weren’t given a set return date” and “‘no guarantees’ was emphasized at length.” Rex Casteel, who cleared hazard logs within the city of Paradise after the devastating Camp Fire, added that whereas that is solely his fifth winter, he has by no means encountered something like this work stoppage earlier than.

“They saved money at the end of this year, but they are going to be squeezing their workforce to get compliance done next year,” mentioned Evans.