PGE briefs investors on progress toward improving its gas, electric infrastructure

Officials from Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E) briefed more than 150 representatives from potential financial backers on its progress toward investing in its gas and electric infrastructure for customers in Northern and Central California.

The briefing took place at PG&E’s Wildfire Command Center in San Ramon, Calif., where company leaders track daily progress in key areas such as electric system hardening, miles of power lines cleared of vegetation and trees, equipment inspections, weather status, and future risk-reduction work plans.

“We are encouraging investors from around the world to deploy their capital in California to reimagine and rebuild our energy system to make it safer and more reliable. As we are seeing with California’s current drought-fueled wildfires, we are in a war on climate change, and investment capital is one of the necessary tools in our arsenal to deliver the energy system that our hometowns deserve,” Patti Poppe, CEO of PG&E Corporation, said.

PG&E invests roughly $7.5 billion in its electric, gas, and generation infrastructure each year. About $5 billion of that comes from income from customers, so the company must secure an additional $2.5 billion from non-customer financial sources like investors. Those outside investments are needed to fund accelerated risk reduction and safety improvements, reliability upgrades, and clean energy assets.

Recently, PG&E announced an initiative to expand the undergrounding of electric distribution power lines in High Fire Threat Districts (HFTDs). The multi-year initiative calls for undergrounding approximately 10,000 miles of power lines. It is part of an ongoing effort to mitigate the damage and occurrence of wildfires. Other efforts include installing stronger poles and covered power lines; deploying remote grids and community microgrids; targeted sectionalizing and grid reconfiguration; investing in centralized data analytics to reduce risk; conducting enhanced vegetation management; and scaling the deployment of emerging technologies to proactively mitigate wildfire risk.