It’s no surprise to many California residents that their power will likely be shut off today and in the near future. Many PG&E customers received a notification this Labor Day weekend that their power may be turned off due to wildfires and the current heat wave. But which counties are possibly going to be affected?
PG&E reported that customers in portions of Amador, Butte, Calaveras, El Dorado, Humboldt, Kern, Lake, Napa, Nevada, Placer, Plumas, Shasta, Sierra, Sonoma, Tehama, Tuolumne and Yuba may have their power shut off on Labor Day. The utility company sent out notifications to mainly its medical baseline customers, so those who depend on electricity for critical life-sustaining equipment have a heads up.
According to PG&E, “the extreme weather is also increasing demand on the statewide electric grid. Separate from any PSPS event, the state’s grid operator has issued a Flex Alert, a voluntary call for energy conservation to help balance power supply with demand.” The alert is running from 3 to 9 p.m the entire holiday weekend, ending on Labor Day.
PG&E says its in-house meteorologists and its Wildfire Safety Operation Center and Emergency Operation Center will continue to monitor the weather conditions, and says additional customer notifications will continue to be shared as needed, depending on the weather.
Also new for 2020 is PG&E’s improved weather watch and PSPS event notifications. Due to customer feedback, PG&E has found that its customers want a heads up immediately once the utility company knows if it may shut off power, so people can plan.
According to PG&E, “state officials classify more than half of PG&E’s 70,000-square-mile service area in Northern and Central California as having a high fire threat, given dry grasses and the high volume of dead and dying trees. The state’s high-risk areas have tripled in size in seven years. No single factor drives a PSPS, as each situation is unique. PG&E carefully reviews a combination of many criteria when determining if power should be turned off for safety.”
So what can you do to protect yourself from future PSPS events?
First, it’s important to understand your options. As a California resident, facing power shut offs is becoming the norm. The best way we can all do our part is to take pressure off the grid. Installing energy storage (or batteries) like Tesla, Enpahse or Genrac into your home is one way to protect yourself from the outages. Many people believe that you need solar as well to install batteries, but it’s most definitely not the case. While there are benefits to installing both solar and storage, outfitting your home with storage alone is a good way to get started, especially with the state’s current SGIP rebate offerings in place. Stellar Energy offers its customers batteries from the top solar and storage companies in the market. Make sure to call us today to understand the many ways you can protect yourself from future outages.