More Than 53K PG&E Customers Remain In The Dark Wednesday Night
SACRAMENTO (CBS13) — PG&E gave the all-clear for crews to inspect and re-energize power lines across Northern California Wednesday.
By 6 p.m., the utility restored power to approximately 95% of 1,091,844 customers who lost power in the Oct. 26 and Oct. 29 power shutoffs. Nearly 400,000 customers were without power for both events.
Wednesday night, approximately 53,000 customers remained in the dark in the foothills and Sonoma County, where the Kincade Fire is burning. PG&E estimates the remaining customers will have their power restored Thursday.
The customers in the following counties are still without power: Calaveras, Colusa, El Dorado, Kern, Lake, Marin, Mendocino, Napa, Nevada, Plumas, Shasta, Sierra, Sonoma and Yuba.
You can check the current outages here.
Swipe through photos from inside PG&E's Wildfire Safety Operations Center
According to PG&E, crews have already found 83 instances of damage to their lines while working to re-energize customers on Wednesday. In a separate filing about the Oct. 9 PSPS event, the utility noted 118 instances of damage to their lines, caused by vegetation and wind. That included 44 instances that would have likely caused arcing if the lines were energized and 12 other cases where fires could have been started by PG&E equipment that broke in the wind.
READ MORE: PG&E Reveals 118 Instances Of Wind, Tree Damage From Oct. 9 Power Shutoff
For some customers, this means the fifth night in the dark as temperatures begin to drop. The outages have affected many businesses and families who lost thousands of dollars during the shutoffs.
PG&E announced it will be providing a $100 credit to residential customers and $250 credit to businesses impacted by the Oct. 9 shutoff, which impacted approximately 738,000 customers. The company said it is sending reimbursements for the specific event "due to the hardship caused by the website and communications issues," not because of political pressure.
"We recognize our execution in these areas fell short of expectations, and we have taken steps to reduce those issues going forward...This is not an industry-standard practice, nor approved as part of a tariff, but we believe it is the right thing to do for our customers in this case, given the challenges with our website and call center communications," the company said.
There is no indication at this time that PG&E will provide further credits to customers for the following PSPS events.
