BILL ANALYSIS Ó
SENATE COMMITTEE ON ENERGY, UTILITIES AND COMMUNICATIONS
Senator Ben Hueso, Chair
2015 - 2016 Regular
Bill No: SB 1028 Hearing Date: 4/5/2016
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|Author: |Hill |
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|Version: |3/17/2016 As Amended |
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|Urgency: |No |Fiscal: |Yes |
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|Consultant:|Nidia Bautista |
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SUBJECT: Electrical corporations: local publicly owned electric
utilities: electrical cooperatives: wildfire mitigation plans
DIGEST: This bill would require CPUC-regulated utilities to
file wildfire mitigation plans and requires the CPUC to vote to
approve and audit those plans. The bill also requires
publicly-owned utilities to file wildfire mitigation plans with
their governing boards.
ANALYSIS:
Existing law:
1.Provides that the CPUC has regulatory authority over public
utilities, including electric corporations. (California
Constitution, Article 3 and 4)
2.Requires the CPUC to develop formal procedures to incorporate
safety in a rate case application by an electrical corporation
or gas corporations. (Public Utilities Code §750)
This bill:
1. Establishes a new chapter in the Public Utilities Code to
address wildfire mitigation and requires each electrical
corporation to construct, maintain and operate its electrical
lines and equipment in a manner that will minimize the risk of
catastrophic wildfire posed by electrical lines and equipment.
SB 1028 (Hill) Page 2 of ?
2. Requires electrical corporations to annually prepare a
wildfire mitigation plan for the upcoming compliance period,
which would begin roughly at the start of the fall fire
season.
3. Requires the wildfire mitigation plan to include specified
information, including: accounting of responsible persons for
executing the plan, a description of the preventive strategies
and programs to be adopted by the electrical corporation to
minimize the risk of its electric systems causing catastrophic
wildfires, the metrics that will be used to evaluate the
plan's performance, how it will monitor and audit the plan,
and any other information required by the CPUC.
4. Requires the CPUC to accept, accept provisionally, or reject
the electrical corporation's wildfire mitigation plan as
expeditiously as possible, but no later than 30 days before
the start of the compliance period.
5. Requires the CPUC when it provisionally accepts a plan to
include any limitations or conditions, the timespan the
provisional acceptance will be in force, and other
requirements.
6. Requires the CPUC when rejecting an electrical corporation's
plan to allow them to resubmit a plan within 30 days.
SB 1028 (Hill) Page 3 of ?
7. Authorizes the CPUC to determine the contents of the
electrical corporation's plan if the CPUC determines they will
not be able to prepare an acceptable plan.
8. Requires the CPUC to conduct audits to determine if the
electrical corporation is satisfactorily complying with its
plan.
9. Authorizes the CPUC to contract with a third-party to conduct
the audits, evaluate the plans or conduct inspections, and to
require the electrical corporation to reimburse for any
related expenses.
10. Requires each publicly-owned electric utility and electrical
cooperative to construct, maintain, and operate is electrical
lines and equipment in a manner that will minimize the risk of
catastrophic wildfire posed by those electrical lines and
equipment.
11. Requires the governing board of the local publicly owned
electric utility or electrical cooperative to determine, in
consultation with fire department(s) or relevant agencies,
whether any portion of the geographical area where the
utility's overhead lines and equipment are located poses a
significant risk of catastrophic wildfire from electrical
lines and equipment.
SB 1028 (Hill) Page 4 of ?
12. Requires the electric utility to annually present to the
board for its approval wildfire mitigation measures that the
utility will undertake should it determine that a portion of
its area is at risk of catastrophic wildfire.
Background
California wildfire and electric systems. In October of 2007, a
series of large wildfires ignited and burned hundreds of thousands
of acres in several counties in Southern California. The fires
displaced nearly one million residents, destroyed thousands of
homes, and took the lives of ten people and an additional seven
who died from efforts to evacuate or from other fire-related
causes. Among the fires was the Witch Fire, one of the nation's
most damaging, which was ignited by power lines. More recently,
the September 2015 Butte Fire - which burned over 70,000 acres in
Amador and Calaveras Counties, destroyed 818 structures, and
caused two fatalities - may have been caused by contact between an
electric overhead line and a tree. According to CAL FIRE's, power
lines were the second-leading cause of wildfires in 2013.
Electrical equipment can act as an ignition source, including
downed power lines, arcing, and conductor contact with trees.
Although electric systems do not routinely cause catastrophic
fires, they are known to cause hundreds of small fires every year.
Risks for wildfires have also increased with the extended drought
and bark beetle infestation that has increased tree mortalities
and, as a result, increased the risk and fuel for wildfires.
CPUC efforts to address wildfires. After the 2007 fires ravaged
several areas of the state, in 2008, the CPUC initiated rulemaking
proceeding to address fires related to utility poles. The CPUC's
efforts have resulted in additional requirements on utilities to
reduce the likelihood of fires started by or threatening utility
facilities, including improved vegetation management, as well as,
requiring the utilities to develop electric utility fire
prevention plans. The first phase also adopted fire hazard maps
of high-risk areas in Southern California. In May 2015, the CPUC
open a new rulemaking proceeding to develop and adopt fire-threat
maps and fire-safety regulations (R. 15-05-006). The CPUC tasked
CAL FIRE to oversee and select outside experts to develop a more
refined statewide fire hazard map. As noted in the Scoping Memo,
the fire-threat map will be based on approximately 150 terabytes
of fire-weather data, which will be used to run millions of fire
simulations to build a high resolution, statewide fire-treat map.
The CPUC and CAL FIRE have conducted workshops to solicit feedback
SB 1028 (Hill) Page 5 of ?
on the draft map. After a couple of delays, a final map was
issued on February 12, 2016. Additionally, the CPUC has announced
a safety en banc related to utility pole safety to occur on April
28, 2016 in Los Angeles. The agenda for the en banc includes
representatives from CAL FIRE, electric utilities, communications
utilities and providers and other stakeholders.
Performance-based rules vs. prescriptive rules. As noted, the
CPUC's rulemaking efforts to address wildfires and electric
systems have been active since 2008, with several phases, in two
separate proceedings. As the author notes, these efforts have
resulted in the adoption of over 70 proposed rule changes with
often prescriptive standards - such as dictating clearances
between power lines and trees. The author advocates for the need
to establish performance or risk-based safety rules that focus on
the identification of hazards and set goals, providing the
utilities flexibility in achieving the goals. This approach would
be akin to the CPUC efforts to address pipeline safety after the
PG&E San Bruno fatal explosion. A performance-based approach,
according to the author, would stand in contrast to the length of
time used in assessing individual measures with the prescriptive
approach. However, it would seem reasonable that the two
approaches do not need to be mutual exclusive. The
recommendations in this bill to require electrical corporations to
develop mitigation plans and have them appropriately evaluated can
both compliment and be informed by the efforts to establish
prescriptive measures.
Prior/Related Legislation
SB 1463 (Moorlach) would require the CPUC, in consultation with
the CAL FIRE, to use specified criteria in determining areas that
are at high risk from wildfires and require undergrounding of any
replacement, relocation or construction of transmission,
subtransmission, and distribution systems in those areas. The bill
is scheduled to be heard in this committee.
FISCAL EFFECT: Appropriation: No Fiscal Com.:
Yes Local: Yes
SUPPORT:
Rural County Representatives of California
SB 1028 (Hill) Page 6 of ?
OPPOSITION:
None received
ARGUMENTS IN SUPPORT: The author comments that the CPUC opened a
proceeding meant to address wildfire prevention more than seven
years ago. In the proceeding the electric and telecommunications
utilities have continued to be allowed to postpone discussion of
increased construction standards in high wildfire risk areas.
contrast the slowness of the CPUC's regulatory proceeding with
that of the electric safety regulator in the Australian state of
Victoria in response to catastrophic "Black Saturday" bush fires
of 2009. California's electric utilities currently file annual
fire prevention plans with the CPUC, but these plans are of
varying quality, have never been evaluated to determine their
adequacy, and they have never been audited.
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