Blackouts Tied to Wildfires Are Spreading Beyond California
Fire-Related Power Cuts Spread Outside California for First Time
(Bloomberg) -- It’s no longer just California shutting off power in high-risk fire zones.
Oregon’s Portland General Electric Co. on Monday temporarily turned off power for about 5,000 customers near Mt. Hood -- a move it described as a “last resort” as dry winds threatened to take down power lines and ignite fires. It’s the first time such a public-safety shutoff has happened outside the Golden State, according to Michael Wara, director of the Climate and Energy Policy Program at Stanford University.
In California, utility giant PG&E Corp. is doing the same in parts of its territory.
The U.S. West has been sweltering through its second major heat wave in a month, and with strong winds raking the region, more utilities in other states may have to follow California’s lead. What was widely used last year by PG&E as an extreme response to preventing wildfires is now becoming more common.
“I think it’s very likely,” especially in places where people live near areas prone to burn, Wara said by email.
In a press conference Tuesday afternoon, Oregon Governor Kate Brown said some of the fires erupting across her state appear to have been started by power lines falling during the wind storm.
“We really appreciate PGE’s proactive efforts and would hope that other utilities, whether they be consumer- or industrial-owned, would take the same proactive actions,” Brown said. “My team is working with folks to make sure that that happens.”
The power cuts are intended to limit the devastation from longer and more dangerous fire seasons across the U.S. West. In California this year, wildfires have already burned more than 2.2 million acres, the most on record.
Turning off power is a fairly new and controversial practice, and its use in California last year triggered investigations while utilities defended them as necessary in the face of increasingly wild weather. Utilities in the state say they will need to use the power shutoffs until they can sufficiently harden their grids by installing covered power lines, stronger poles and burying some lines. They also are aggressively trimming tree limbs and other vegetation away from their power lines and installing more cameras and weather stations.
PG&E’s preemptive shutoffs that started late Monday could leave about 172,000 homes and businesses in the dark. Edison International’s Southern California utility said it may start shutting off electricity to more than 54,000 customers at 6 p.m. local time Tuesday.
Power shutoffs are “a way to get around some near-term challenges, but in the long-run, the utilities can strengthen the grid to provide reliability,” said Travis Miller, an analyst at Morningstar, in an interview.
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