Officials from PG&E announced late Tuesday morning that planned power outages in Contra Costa, Alameda, Sonoma, and Napa counties would not happen because of the current heat wave in Northern California.
Tamar Sarkissian said that even though temperatures were still high across the area, winds have slowed down enough to lower the risk of fire and eliminate the need for any outages in the greater Bay Area. The small part of Napa that might still have been affected as of Monday night was added to the report.
The news comes after PG&E said in an update on Monday night that the planned power outages in Contra Costa, Alameda, Sonoma, and most of Napa counties would not happen.
When it got really hot, power lines could start wildfires. That’s why the Public Safety Power Shutoff, or PSPS, was planned. Customers in East Bay and North Bay counties who were told about the outages won’t have their power cut off, but about 140 customers in Napa County north of Calistoga could still lose power.
On top of that, officials said that power blackouts could happen again on Tuesday in places that weren’t affected Monday night. More than 13,000 people in 13 counties, such as Alameda, Contra Costa, Napa, and, were told by PG&E that their power could be cut off.
Several thousand Pacific Gas and Electric customers lost power Monday morning because of planned Public Safety Power Shutoffs in Butte, Shasta, Tehama, and Colusa counties. These places are at high risk of fire.
One day ago, the National Weather Service said that higher up in the Bay Area, Central Coast, and Central Valley, wind gusts were likely.
The first people to lose power on Monday were mostly in Shasta County, where 7,709 people were affected. On Monday, high temperatures were expected to reach 106 degrees.
John Theobald, who lives in Napa County, said, “That rock that shoots out up there is called Table Rock.” “I think it’s been over 100 before, but with these winds, they’re going at least 80 to 90 miles per hour.” That being said, this is a very bad place for it, especially around Calistoga.”
Theobald lives in the hills just above Calistoga, which is where PG&E said the power might go out. But that’s not the only safety measure in place for this part of Napa County.
“Look at this gap over here. This area looked just like that,” Theobald said, referring to some trees nearby. “It was that thick and dense down there with all the bushes.” If you turn around and look back up here, you can see that those are not wooden poles. Those sticks won’t catch fire. They’ve done many different things.
Everything in this area is caused by the frequent winds and fires in recent years.
“There have been a lot of them,” Theobald said. “Really, it’s been an incredible decade.”
“This is where the Tubbs Fire began,” said friend Jim Knighton. “Glass Fire 2020 went right through here and destroyed everything.” Because of this, many of us put in other sources to be safe in case something goes wrong.
“Well, PG&E communicates pretty well what they’re going to do, so we know about it” he said. “I think we all think about fire so much more now given what’s happened.”
A lot of people who live here will tell you that the shutoffs are like the places that were cleared along the lines; they’re just part of the scenery now.
“105 is what it should be,” Theobald said. “You just hope it’s not too windy.”
There won’t be any power outages like the ones the area had in 2019 when PG&E started the program and there were a lot more PSPS events.
PG&E spent a lot of time and money to make the grid more accurate so that when they turn off the power, they can do it in more precise places and affect fewer people.
