PG&E to underground 600+ miles of powerlines by the end of 2023 - KRCR
PG&E to underground 600+ miles of powerlines by the end of 2023 | KRCR
REDDING, Calif. — — PG&E is on track to underground more than 600 miles of electric powerlines by the end of this year. This is a part of their larger plan to underground 10,000 miles across the state to reduce wildfire risk.
Undergrounding reduces the change for ignition in that location by 99 percent. It also will reduce power outages, improve reliability and make the system safer overall. According to PG&E, this year they have undergrounded 256 miles to date, and there are more projects coming to the Northstate.
Spokesperson Paul Moreno said they will begin two projects in Shasta County beginning in mid-April. One is in the Happy Valley area West of Anderson which will underground 32 miles and the other in Cottonwood along Gas Point Road will underground 37 miles.
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"So we look at modeling to help us determine where we should start with our undergrounding of power lines," Moreno said. "These areas are in high fire threat areas and they're fairly densely populated as well. So we're going to embark on these programs and should finish by the end of about 2023."
He said these projects will create some traffic impact as they will be undergrounding on the side of the road, but they are working in sections to reduce the impact to the community.
Shasta County is not the only area seeing underground lines. Moreno said most of their focus for this year and next are in Shasta, Plumas and Butte County but they have projects across the Northstate.
In Butte County, 103 miles were completed in 2022 and about 149 miles are expected to be completed this year.
In Pluma County, less than one mile was completed in 2022, but about 43 miles are expected to be undergrounded in 2023.
"We're going to do even more in 2024 and we have undergrounding projects resuming in Plymouth County this month and some others starting in other parts of Butte County as well," Moreno said.
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Renewable energy sources — once the fuel of the future, then practical in specific, narrow applications — are increasingly economic mainstream sources of power generation. Hydropower was long the mainstay of U.S. renewable electricity generation, although wind power surpassed hydro for the first time in 2019, and solar continues its rapid growth. The continued growth of wind and solar, with their fluctuations, is tied in part to improvements in storage technology: batteries.