State utility regulators get tough, tell PG&E to turn over records of troubled gas pipelines

[cal04]

Source: LA Times

California utility regulators are taking an increasingly tough stance toward Pacific Gas & Electric Co. one week after a gas pipeline explosion and fire killed at least four people and destroyed or damaged dozens of homes in the San Francisco suburb of San Bruno.

Late Friday, the executive director of the California Public Utilities Commission wrote PG&E President Christopher Johns asking for specific detailed information about potential weak links in its 5,700-mile natural gas transmission network.

Foremost on the PUC’s list of seven demands is a request for PG&E’s list of its top 100 high-priority pipeline projects. The San Francisco-based, for-profit company repeatedly refers to the list in documents filed with the PUC but has not provided the agency or journalists with the actual document.

(snip)
In addition to asking for a breakdown of replacement priorities on the PG&E system, the PUC also is ordering the company “to describe and provide justification for how long it will take” to develop a list of locations where manual shut-off valves might be replaced with automatic or remotely controlled shut-off valves. Such devices can be closed in less than 10 minutes, experts say. It took PG&E workers more than two hours to close the manual valves on either side of the San Pedro rupture, leaving gas in the line that fed an out-of-control fire.

Read more: http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2010/09/state-utility-regulators-get-tough-tell-pge-to-turn-over-records-of-troubled-gas-pipelines.html

[Ernesto]

1. works for me nt

[AtheistCrusader]

2. Generally you want to do this BEFORE the pipeline levels a neighborhood.

[wordpix]

3. it's known as the BP Syndrome - regulators deal with these issues AFTER the disaster occurs

So let's have more repugs elected in Nov. so we can continue our great nation of, by and for the corporations and the public good, be damned. :sarcasm:

[YvonneCa]

4. Good thought...

... :7 I have one of these things two houses away from me...if I ever smell gas, I'm telling everyone to get out.

[CountAllVotes]

5. PG&E is here now

They are busy digging up the main street of the town I live in suddenly. This is a rural area and much goes undone. I wonder why they are suddenly madly working away like there is no tomorrow? Maybe that is because there is a problem and if something goes wrong, there will be no tomorrow dare I suggest!

:kick: