A recent wave of power outages has been affecting people in northern San Luis Obispo County for several weeks, with some of the outages lasting up to 20 hours.
With many residents frustrated by the back-to-back unplanned power outages in northern SLO County, PG&E spokesperson Eric Daniels came into the SLO County Board of Supervisors meeting last week to explain why these outages were happening.
Daniels said that to reduce the risk of wildfires, PG&E has installed a new “fast trip” feature that automatically shuts off power when a foreign object is detected in transmission lines.
But Daniels said this safety measure has some issues.
“These fast trip settings have a sensitivity, and what we are finding is, they are overreacting," Daniels said. "So, we are trying to hone that in.”
Five out of the ten most destructive wildfires in California since 2015 have been linked to PG&E equipment, including the Camp Fire in 2018 which destroyed the town of Paradise and killed 85 people.
Mark Mesesan with PG&E said as frustrating as these outages are, the new safety measures had to be installed to prevent another tragic wildfire.
Once a fast trip feature has shut off power, Mesesan said it isn’t as easy as flipping on a switch to turn it back on. Field crews have to inspect the entire circuit, and inspections can only take place during the day via helicopter or ground crews hiking into remote locations — which can take hours.
“We apologize to our customers in these areas. But they are required," Mesesan said. "We have to do something to meet the threat posed by wildfires and reduce the threat of our equipment starting these fires.”
Mesesan said while PG&E continues to work on the programming for the fast trip feature, customers in northern SLO County should be prepared for additional unexpected outages.
“It’s going to take continuing adjustment of our system, we are going to continue to safeguard our system," Mesesan said. "We just ask for the patience of our customers as we work to do that.”
