PG&E to cut power to almost a million people in California again
Welcome to Venezuela: PG&E will impose its second planned blackout today for almost a million customers in northern California, all in a vain attempt to prevent wildfires.
Leftist politicians like to blame climate change for these fires, but there is no scientific evidence for such a claim. Instead, the evidence points to the policies of those very leftist politicians, who have been micromanaging PG&E for almost a decade, preventing it from doing proper maintenance, while also forbidding the clearing of brush from state lands.
If you live in California be warned. This is only a taste of what your dismal future is going to be, especially as I see no sign that the voters have any intention of firing these politicians. If anything, election trends have been to give them more power.
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Welcome to Venezuela: PG&E will impose its second planned blackout today for almost a million customers in northern California, all in a vain attempt to prevent wildfires.
Leftist politicians like to blame climate change for these fires, but there is no scientific evidence for such a claim. Instead, the evidence points to the policies of those very leftist politicians, who have been micromanaging PG&E for almost a decade, preventing it from doing proper maintenance, while also forbidding the clearing of brush from state lands.
If you live in California be warned. This is only a taste of what your dismal future is going to be, especially as I see no sign that the voters have any intention of firing these politicians. If anything, election trends have been to give them more power.
Readers!
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black. Your support allows me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Only now does it appear that Washington might finally recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are four ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
3. A Paypal Donation or subscription:
4. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652
You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above.
Clear cut power line right of ways (like they do in the rest of the US) and stop paying to rebuild houses built in marginal areas.
Remove the fuel and the wildfires go away.
“Leftist politicians like to blame climate change for these fires, but there is no scientific evidence for such a claim.”
80 mph wind gusts… in California
more CO2 means more plant life, i am not against climate change, but to keep denying it is insane. The climate is always changing even before homo sapiens. Some desert areas will shrink and some will expand. Cali is expanding. Deal with it.
Kyle the Santa Ana winds have been in existence for the entire recorded history of the area. They’re nothing new, they’re just getting heavy coverage by a complicit media pandering to the sheep.
kyle: I should have used “global warming” instead of “climate change.” My bad.
Spent my entire life living in the foothills, never had 80 mph winds, much less at the end of October
” Robert Zimmerman
October 26, 2019 at 4:05 pm
kyle: I should have used “global warming” instead of “climate change.” My bad.”
Call it what you want, doesn’t stop it from being real.
Kyle: If you think these winds are caused by global warming, you are going to have to cite a paper to prove it, because in my extensive reading of the climate literature I’ve never seen one. Only politicians make this claim.
See two past posts on BtB:
Extreme weather events in 2013 are at an all time low.
The Fantasy of Extreme Weather
Since 2013 nothing really has changed in the science. There is no evidence that extreme events are increasing, nor has any scientist been able to show evidence to link any extreme events that have happened to an increase in CO2 in the atmosphere.
You want me to show you a paper the shows how an unprecedented event occuring right now is caused? I am pretty sure that a paper cannot appear as an event happens. might need a few minutes(years) of evidence gathering, comparing, crosschecking.
Kyle,
Per the NWS, the 80 MPH winds are in the “highest peaks”…..in other words, nothing unusual, as winds at high elevation are normally higher than wind speeds in lower elevations.
The headlines are grabbing this snip and using it out of context as hyperbole.
The actual forecast for most of the area is 30-40 MPH winds or lower.
https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2019-10-26/diablo-wind-california-kincade-fire-tick-fire-risk-weather
If you take the extremes and put them in the headlines as the absolute forecast, you achieve the desired result. Part and parcel of the climate change tactics….
It’s easy to scare the sheep.
Yes the Santa Ana winds have been around long before Industrialization. But (almost said never) been as strong as its been (in last century?), as late in the season. Saying otherwise is lying to yourself. Which is human nature(the good old days).
Kyle, proof?
Scientifically accurate measurements?
Just because the highest wind speed was recorded in 2011 doesn’t mean that was the highest wind speed, it means it was the highest recorded in the very, very tiny period of history where we’ve had accurate instruments in the area.
Kyle: Well I decided to do a quick search, and came up with two papers that studied the history of the Santa Ana winds:
The santa ana winds of california [pdf]
A 560-year record of Santa Ana fires reconstructed from charcoal deposited in the Santa Barbara Basin, California [pdf]
The first, covering a much shorter period (the last three decades), notes that there are wild fluctuations in the winds. From the second’s abstract:
I could do some more digging, but the only papers that I can so far find that suggest a change in the Santa Ana winds are computer models and simulations, not research of actual wind data.
Did a little more searching and came up with this article:
Was Global Warming A Significant Factor in California’s Camp Fire? The Answer is Clearly No.
In referring to the terrible Camp Fire that struck California last year, the article notes:
The article also cites at least one paper that “show that global warming should weaken southern California’s Santa Ana winds.” [emphasis mine] The article notes that this paper [pdf] is one of several.
I suspect that there is absolutely no consensus around these conclusions, and you could find other papers that say the opposite. The point is that the evidence is very unclear. First, we as yet have no understanding of the consequences of increased CO2 in the atmosphere. The models (all predicting global warming) have all flunked their test in the past 20 years.
Second, we have no evidence that these winds have changed as CO2 has increased. If anything, the data suggests otherwise.
Thus, your conclusion (based on pure belief and anecdotal data) that the winds are greater and this was caused by global warming, is based on nothing but a desire on your part that it be so. That is not how science works.
How do Electric Transmission Lines Work?
Practical Engineering/ September 2019
https://youtu.be/qjY31x0m3d8
9:49
I live in the mid-peninsula area of San Mateo County. Power is off to this whole area and the winds are very mild. Even my wife is sure there is political shenanigans going on and she is not one to lightly suggest political conspiracy’s in any shape or form. Looking over the news, one would think all of Northern California is ablaze, but it’s isolated to a specific spot north of Santa Rosa in Sonoma County. Sure, it’s bad for the people adjacent to the fire, but the rest of us are scratching our heads and wondering why we are forced to live in the dark on what otherwise would be pleasant Autumn weather.
Looking at the media and government response urging everyone to hunker down for “historically strong winds” and effectively jump at our own shadows, one has to wonder what the long game is they are playing here. Whatever it is, it does not bode well.
Now that power usage has been politicized I have no doubt that in the future things like air quality, gasoline distribution, and water use will be the subject of said shenanigans.
Sucks for people who keep food in their freezers.
Maybe home canning will become fashionable again? I keep a seldom used 7000 W generator for when the power goes out. (It can also be used for camping) I just trip the main breaker and plug a double end 220 cord into a 220 outlet which feeds the entire house with 110. Always remember to turn off the main Power supply so you don’t try to feed the entire neighborhood like a solar panel does.
These winds were predicted because a cold low-pressure system passed above California. (We have been receiving snow all day in Utah)
Because of the wraparound affect, the storm has been coming from the east traveling west back toward California. Conclusion, this is just normal weather phenomenon well understood and predictable.
The weather this year is nothing exceptional in the Bay Area for this time of year. In October of 1991 there was the Oakland Hills Fire that was driven by high winds and in a single October burned more than 2800 homes killing about 25 people.
What is exceptional is the deteriorating state of our infrastructure. Many areas have wood utility poles are decades past their rated lifetime surrounded by dense underbrush and trees that have grown unchecked since the utilities were first installed. Mix in seasonal strong winds and each Autumn becomes a disaster in the making.
Perhaps if our politicians were directing expenditures towards rebuilding our state’s electrical infrastructure rather than a useless high-speed train to nowhere we might have an electrical grid that could withstand seasonal winds like it did when it was much newer.
Instead, those of us in California get to beta test The Green New Deal for the rest of the nation. Here’s a hint, it sucks.
In the meantime, the Sierra club is fighting even minimal proper maintenance:
https://www.sierraclub.org/california/cnrcc/pge-clearcuts-power-lines
Given the danger from arc for a power line extends to 25′ from the line, even the 15′ proposed by PGE is insufficient for some lines.
commodude–
Very good stuff.
15 feet? Yow, what could possibly go wrong?!
Anecdotally– we’re getting hammered with high winds and rain in SW Michigan. My electric is rock-solid exactly because our utility went on a tree-trimming binge the past 5 years; residential and transmission line right-of-ways. (which are considerably larger than 15 or 25 feet.)
Commodude – the article has great insight into the disconnects
CA law requires 4 ft clearance that Sierra begrudgingly accepts as the law
The proposal of 15 ft is seen by the Sierra Club as a disaster on many fronts including CO2 release, loss of vegetation and the CO2 the veggies eat and the aesthetics of the new cutting. – I wonder how they see the newly burned areas asthetically?
In PA I have a home plot of about 10 acres and a camp on 7. The power companies are hard pressed to keep line right of ways trimmed to 15 ft. But make no mistake if they are trimming they will enforce the 15 ft. The only exception is active cultivation – your yard. There they trim ridiculous “shapes” in the trees if the line is over top. They will work with the property owner and have with me.
This type of trimming is for distribution lines (relatively lower voltage) not transmission lines. With transmission lines the right of way is much wider and anti vegetation sprays are used as well. They also use these:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Mfz1YrpMbBg
The issues in PA are about keeping service up due to the trees shorting or downing the lines – not fires as much. CA brings both power loss and fire issues – a much harder problem. Therefore they need more diligent care. The objections of the Seirra Club and others to the necessary maintenance to power right of ways (ROW) loads on to this already difficult problem.
The result of not being able to maintain the ROW is fire and thousands of acres burned as well as loss of life and property – every year. This is the predicted and actual result.
The question is how to correctly place the responsibility to those groups who prevent PG&E from maintaining their lines.
Kyle wrote: “You want me to show you a paper the shows how an unprecedented event occuring right now is caused? I am pretty sure that a paper cannot appear as an event happens. might need a few minutes(years) of evidence gathering, comparing, crosschecking.”
For more than a decade they have been telling us that these unprecedented events are occurring. They should already have these papers in order to back up such claims. But they don’t.
Considering that climates change slowly — over multiple decades, otherwise it is only weather — and that even NOAA’s data shows no warming in the past decade ( https://behindtheblack.com/behind-the-black/points-of-information/no-warming-in-u-s-since-2005/ ), neither phenomenon can really be blamed for California’s wildfires these past couple of years. What can be shown is 1) that it is only recently that high power electrical lines have been the cause of wildfires and 2) that only in the past couple of decades has PG&E not been allowed to control vegetation near these lines. If changing climates or warming globes were responsible, then it should be a barely perceptible change in the rate of power line caused fires — the signal being difficult to dig out of the noisy data.
From the article linked by commodude: “‘The California Public Utilities Commission requires PG&E maintain at least a 4-foot clearance between vegetation and power lines in high fire-threat areas year-round to help ensure electric reliability and public safety.’”
I remember three decades ago, before California legislation changed the requirements, power lines that ran through tall trees had wide clearings around their towers and lines — wide enough to build at least a six lane freeway (three lanes each direction), perhaps 30 feet or so from the power lines. Four feet is less than the lines swing in winds. What the [ahem] were Californian politicians and bureaucrats thinking?
Also from the article: “With the planned clear cut width of 30 feet, the path of destruction could be considerable.”
That is the way it should be. The Sierra Club really should ask itself just how considerable the path of destruction is for these wildfires that have been generated by the narrow clearance zones.
mpthompson wrote that he lives in the mid-peninsula area of San Mateo County. In the past, I have walked in the hills on some trails behind Foothill College, hiking past the power lines that feed the peninsula and mpthompson. The trees at that point of the distribution lines are not overly tall, being mostly Live Oak.
Since PG&E has had such difficulty controlling vegetation, what has it been like for the rest of the state, away from the San Francisco peninsula? Are the fires getting worse due to lack of vegetation control in areas far beyond the power lines? Much of California is chaparral. The photograph at the top of the following Wikipedia entry is similar to the vegetation near mpthompson
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaparral
The vegetation is green, but it does not receive much rain from late spring to late autumn. The Santa Ana winds have always caused this time of year to be a major fire hazard, in California. Right now is the dry season, and a lot of California is brown (gold) grass. The wet season is the rest of the year, when a lot of California is green grass. Most of California has only these two seasons, and wildfires have been a major problem since before last century.
During a normal rainfall year, the grass dies in the early summer and becomes a major source of fuel for wildfires to spread, resulting in the worst fires in California. Years when there is a lot of rain, there is far more grass during the dry season and the additional fuel make the fires worse. Years when there is not much rain during the rainy season, the grass is even drier, and the fires are even worse. Every year is a high fire danger year, and the Santa Ana winds quickly spread the fires far and wide. The difference is the new source of ignition for these fires — unmaintained vegetation near power lines.
Why don’t the politicians and bureaucrats not understand this? Because they flunked their science, technology, engineering, and math classes in school. Probably history and reading, too.
Idiots.
Could this situation be the death nell for the Communists that run California?
https://youtu.be/D8vX5D8BpqI
California lost 13,000 businesses in the last 9 years.
https://youtu.be/eJcT3JbrDRw
That is just not sustainable.
These “Progressive”, politically correct and Liberal / Leftist agendas agendas in politics destroys all.
Chris–
Great stuff!
Californians taking back their state?
https://youtu.be/dYu_OrL0kqw
Couldn’t happen to a nicer Leftist / Progressive.