Press release content from Business Wire. The AP news staff was not involved in its creation.
PG&E to Deploy New Risk Modeling and Fire Spread Technology to Further Reduce Wildfire Risk
February 6, 2021 GMT
SAN FRANCISCO (BUSINESS WIRE) Feb 5, 2021
In a proposal filed today with the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC), Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E or the Utility) detailed its ongoing strategy to reduce wildfire risk, increase situational awareness, and deploy new technology and models to help keep customers and communities safe. Improvements to its 2021 Public Safety Power Shutoff (PSPS) program were also proposed.
PG&E’s 2021 Wildfire Mitigation Plan (WMP) enhances the company’s ongoing, comprehensive Community Wildfire Safety Program designed to address the growing threat of severe weather and wildfires across its service area.
Posted on 18306
Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) has notified a targeted number of customers in small portions of Calaveras, Fresno, Kern, Madera, Mariposa, San Luis Obispo, Santa Barbara, Tulare and Tuolumne counties about a potential Public Safety Power Shutoff (PSPS) Monday night. Dry conditions combined with high wind gusts pose an increased risk for damage to the electric system that could ignite fires in areas with dry vegetation.
PG&E Emergency Operations Center (EOC) is open and the company’s meteorologists are monitoring the situation. In addition to the potential for a PSPS event in parts of PG&E service area, strong and gusty winds may cause flying debris and vegetation which can impact power lines and cause additional outages.
Growing network of weather stations, fire-watch cameras help provide hyperlocal data pasoroblesdailynews.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from pasoroblesdailynews.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
REGISTER STAFF
Pacific Gas and Electric Companyâs expanded network of enhanced weather technology, including weather stations and high-definition fire-watch cameras, helped reduce the size of each Public Safety Power Shutoff event in 2020 on average by 55%, the utility reported.
At the end of 2020, PG&E had 1,000 weather stations and 340 cameras in operation throughout Northern and Central California, providing more precise weather data to the companyâs team of meteorologists and outside agencies. More than 121 of those weather stations and 31 cameras are in the North Bay counties of Marin, Napa and Sonoma.
The weather stations, along with sectionalizing devices that isolate the grid into smaller segments and deployment of temporary generation and microgrids, enabled PG&E to keep the lights on for thousands of customers who would have lost power during comparable weather events in 2019, PG&E said. PG&E removed more than 800,000 customers during 2020 PSPS even