New Blog Post: "PG&E Power Outages Reduce Just a Portion of Wildfire Risk"
WASHINGTON, DC—Resources for the Future (RFF) released a new blog post from Fellow Matthew Wibbenmeyer in response to last week’s major power outages in California, titled "PG&E Power Outages Reduce Just a Portion of Wildfire Risk."
Wibbenmeyer, an expert on the management and economics of wildfires and forest resources, addresses the effectiveness of the PG&E outages in reducing wildfire risk. Wibbenmeyer explains that, although planned power outages remove a particularly hazardous source of ignitions, power lines ignite only five percent of California wildfires, and many other ignition sources remain.
Wibbenmeyer outlines the significant costs to residents and businesses, such as lost business revenue, food waste from offline refrigerators, and the critical health risk assumed by those who rely on electricity to power medical devices. While the planned power outages reduced risk faced by PG&E, and may have mitigated wildfire risk during last week’s wind event, Wibbenmeyer emphasizes that solutions to California’s wildfire problem need to go beyond just reducing ignitions from utilities.
Resources for the Future (RFF) is an independent, nonprofit research institution in Washington, DC. Its mission is to improve environmental, energy, and natural resource decisions through impartial economic research and policy engagement. RFF is committed to being the most widely trusted source of research insights and policy solutions leading to a healthy environment and a thriving economy.
Unless otherwise stated, the views expressed here are those of the individual authors and may differ from those of other RFF experts, its officers, or its directors. RFF does not take positions on specific legislative proposals.
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