PG&E outages: 18,000 in dark as crews make ‘safe and steady progress’ after Sierra storm
More than 18,000 Pacific Gas and Electric Co. customers remained without power Tuesday in five Northern California counties as crews continued to work on equipment damaged by last week’s severe snowstorm.
Vast accumulations of snow, downed trees and other hazards continue to prevent access to repair equipment, according to a Tuesday morning update on the power outages.
Officials on Friday said about 36,000 PG&E customers in the Northern California mountains and foothills were without power. Since then, PG&E crews have made “safe and steady progress” restoring power to customers in the utility’s Sierra Nevada region, PG&E spokeswoman Megan McFarland said in Tuesday’s update. It is unclear when power will be restored for all PG&E customers in the region.
In a Tuesday evening update, the outage totals were reduced to 18,350, McFarland said, down from roughly 23,000 at the start of Tuesday.
McFarland said the large amount of snowfall has caused significant damage to PG&E equipment with more than 1,200 instances of damage in Nevada County alone. There, 10,400 homes and businesses were without power Tuesday evening
The damage in Nevada County included 307 power poles, 580 locations where the conductor or the line needs repair, 171 crossarms and 70 transformers, according to PG&E.
Nevada County has the largest number of PG&E customers without electricity. There were 3,900 homes and businesses in El Dorado County without power Tuesday night, along 4,400 in Placer County and 600 in Sierra County.
McFarland said in the Tuesday evening update crews had “essentially completed their assessments” in Sierra, Nevada, Placer and El Dorado. A portion of Yuba County was also assessed, she said.
“Assessments allow us to create Estimated Times of Restoration (ETOR) that account for amount of damage, equipment and materials needed to make repairs, available resources, hours of daylight and other factors,” she said in an email. “Many customers will be restored in the coming days and we can commit to an ETOR of Tuesday, Jan. 11 for customers.
“To be clear, many customers will be restored earlier, but we wanted to share this Jan. 11 ETOR date to give customers a line of sight into the next period of time.”
PG&E asked for help from more than 100 other utilities to bolster our crews working to restore power. On Tuesday, crews from the City of Roseville, Sacramento Municipal Utility District, Eugene, Oregon, Public Service New Mexico, Tillamook and Lower Valley Energy were assisting PG&E.
“We are relentlessly following up with other mutual aid resources to keep resources heading our way,” McFarland said.
Gov. Gavin Newsom on Thursday declared a state of emergency for 20 counties in response to the winter storms: Alameda, Amador, Calaveras, El Dorado, Humboldt, Lake, Los Angeles, Marin, Monterey, Napa, Nevada, Orange, Placer, Sacramento, San Bernardino, San Luis Obispo, San Mateo, Santa Cruz, Sierra, and Yuba.
The National Weather Service Office in Sacramento said on Tuesday afternoon that the weather is expected to be drying out for the middle part of this week before chances of more rain and snow returns to Northern California on Friday.
Caltrans announced on Tuesday that snow was tapering off in the higher elevations of El Dorado County, providing a few clear days before more precipitation arrives Friday.
This story was originally published January 4, 2022 at 4:23 PM.
