Introduction

The raging fires and continuing power blackouts in California, the richest state in the world’s richest nation, are clearly tragic. Are they largely avoidable?

That is the subject of today’s 10-minute episode.

Continuing

California’s continuing wildfires and power blackouts have caught national and international attention. In just one example, more than 2 million Californians were recently left without power after the state’s largest utility, Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E)--which filed for bankruptcy earlier this year--preemptively shut down transmission lines in the fear that they might spark fires during periods of high autumn winds. Some small businesses lost tens of thousands of dollars, threatening the livelihood of the owners and their employees. People who are dependent on electricity-powered home-based, life-sustaining devices are in danger. Modern phones, e.g., the ones offered with bundled services, need power to work. Even some cell towers are inoperative when the power is off, and the cell phones themselves will eventually need to be recharged.

Power outages cause schools to close, and hospitals to run on emergency power. School homework does not get done (you can read by candlelight, but most schools require computers and Internet access for homework), and people working from home get very little accomplished. 

The fires are burning tens of thousands of acres, and destroying thousands of people’s homes. Last year alone PG&E, California’s largest utility serving 16 million Californians, admitted to being the cause of the Camp Fire, which virtually destroyed Paradise, CA, a town of 26,000 people, and cost 85 lives. And drove PG&E into bankruptcy. My son and his family live in nearby Chico, where firefighters had to do a preventative backburn right up to the edge of his city. 

Consumers blame the state for poor forest management, including not cleaning up dead trees and brush, along with the utility companies for not updating their ossified equipment. The power companies, including PG&E, in turn fault the state for over-regulating utilities to the point they had no resources available to modernize their grids.

PG&E recently went on record as saying this would be the new normal for 10 years or so. California Governor Gavin Newsome has also gone on record, blaming PG&E, citing “dog-eat-dog” capitalism as the root cause. The city of San Jose is leading an effort to take over the investor-owned PG&E, and make it consumer-owned. 

What’s the core issue? Answer: You can't have your cake and eat it, too. In WWII, the FDR administration knew that we had to cut back at home in order to fund a winning effort in the war. Private cars were not available as the automobile factories switched to building military vehicles and airplanes. Everything was rationed, including tires. People were encouraged to save things like kitchen grease (it contains glycerin which is used in making explosives) and trade it with their local grocery store for extra ration coupons. There were constant rallies and other encouragements for citizens to buy war bonds. Rosie the Riveter went to work in the factory, while the men went to war.

President Johnson, a proponent of the Vietnam War, promised something very different; he claimed that we could prosecute the war in Vietnam with no sacrifices needed at home. He famously promised, “We can have guns and butter.” FDR knew better. Johnson should have known better. No entity, including affluent California, can have guns and butter. No entity can have its cake and eat it too.

If California wants to continue with green energy initiatives, which at least initially will cost large sums of money, and at the same time it wants to protect its citizens by upgrading its ancient and dangerous power grid,