Guest essay by Eric Worrall
Electric Utilities are apparently claiming climate change is the real culprit, in response to accusations that their downed power lines triggered recent deadly California wildfires.
Best Shot a Utility Has Against Fire Costs May Be Climate Change
By Mark Chediak
23 February 2018, 11:05 GMT+10
Across America, utility executives are getting grilled this earnings season about the consequences of tax reforms, slackening growth and possible mergers. In California, though, Wall Street just wants to know one thing: Are power companies going to take the heat for deadly wildfires?
California’s two largest utilities, PG&E Corp. and Edison International, have both seen billions of dollars of their market value wiped out by devastating fires that broke out last year. Because of a state law, they could end up on the hook for damages if downed power lines were the cause. Their chief executive officers were prepared for a flood of questions from analysts about the blazes during their earnings calls, and they seized the moment to deliver what was essentially the same line: Climate change is the real problem.
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The strategy could help PG&E and Edison fight the California law known as “inverse condemnation” that holds utilities liable for damages if their equipment’s found to have caused a wildfire — even if they followed safety rules. Edison and PG&E both said during their earnings calls that they’re pressing lawmakers and regulators to change the policy.
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This isn’t the first time I’ve heard the climate defence. In 2015 Hany el-Missiry, Mayor of the city of Alexandria in Egypt, suggested global warming was responsible for severe Nile flooding which inundated his city. Critics pointed out that that much of the flooding was due to serious drain maintenance failures on el-Missiry’s watch.
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The powerline maintenance and protection is a thorny issue.
Is the powerline completely on private property owned or leased by the power company?
No doubt there could be problems with transformers and such, but the actual copper wire route seems to be the issue and government and power companies have to cooperate to get you the juice.
Having grown up and now living in “hurricane alley” on our U.S. Gulf coast, the power folks and local governments share the burden of protecting the lines. That’s cause most of the lines use state or city or federal property, and few own their own right-of-way. So we see county/city crews clearing the branches as well as power company and their hired outfits helping out.
We travel a lot away from here and I am always surprised when I see many powerlines running thru trees and such along the highway. I contrast that with our coastal communities that see much mitigation and “clearing” of the powerlines. Government and the power company split the cost most of the time, but I do not have the actual numbers. Up at my Colorado cabin, our IREA does most of the powerline clearing, and the U.S. Forest Service and BLM do squat. Local government is helpful but not many $$$.
So if you want power ya gotta pay for it, and that includes maintenance and keeping the lines clear of tree limbs.
Finally, If we didn’t prevent wildfires the Rocky Mountain beetle infestation would likely be lots less. It is prolly true that warmer winters will help those suckers live thru the winter, but the big deal is less fires, especially for the lodgepole forests. We have owned our cabin for almost 50 years, so my log book has the required 30 years to qualify for “climatic data”. LOL………… Our beetles seem to come in when wind blows them from a hundred or more miles awways. We spot their sap or maybe a tree they killed a year ago and take “extreme prejudice” measures, plus cut down newly infected trees and burn them or cover with the evil plastic covering.
Gums….
I think they need to do a study to see if the wind turbines are blocking moisture carrying wind currents off of the Pacific. I think it is the wind turbines causing the fires!
Utility companies shouldn’t be penalized when they are forced to contend with “off spec” power from a dozen wind farms with a dozen turbines all operating at different times and producing different quantities of electricity. With this junk power being dumped on the grid is it any surprise that a transformer overheats?
Wind power gives you lots of:
Voltage regulation (magnitude and frequency)
Voltage sags and swells
Harmonics and inter harmonics
Real and reactive power
Sub synchronous resonance issues due to interaction of the electric network and the complex shaft/gear system of the wind turbine.
Wildfires are due to “accumulation of fuel”, not source of ignition. When you allow the fuel to accumulate over decades of fire suppression, and no removal of tinder, you will get wildfires. It is just a question of how long you can get away with living in a tinderbox, before it all goes up in flames. And it will usually be on a hot, windy day that it burns.
Better to manage the problem on a cool, calm day, than to fight it under conditions that are out of control.
This is the leaky roof syndrome. On dry days it isn’t leaking, so no incentive to fix it.
See, here is the problem! You insist on injecting facts and reality into leftards narrative! Shame on you!!!!! How dare you expect them to live in the real world whe,,,,,, SH*T I busted out laughing before I could finish typing that sentence. Bad dawg, no biscuit!