PG&E announces yet another increase to 2024 utility bills...
PG&E wants ratepayers to pay for propaganda that would garner trust it doesn’t deserve | Opinion
Read more at: https://www.sacbee.com/opinion/article287852220.html
The company’s latest gambit is to pass on the cost of a commercial advertisement for its undergrounding activities under the guise of “safety communications” rather than “promotional advertising.” The former can legally be paid for by customers, while the latter must be paid for by shareholders.
But PG&E so rarely acts in good faith toward its customers that Californians can hardly be surprised at such creative bookkeeping.
Opinion
PG&E spokesperson Jennifer Robison said in an emailed statement to The Bee that this ad and similar television spots have cost the company as much as $6 million over the past year. Records in the company’s mandated accounting process with the California Public Utilities Commission show that PG&E requested those costs be covered by a ratepayer-funded fire risk mitigation account.
Don’t let PG&E’s glossy, highly-produced advertisements (that you’re paying for) fool you. Once stingy about these investments, the criminally negligent utility company is going the most expensive route possible and now they are using ratepayers to pay for the very propaganda intended to make us feel good about it.
Despite PG&E CEO Patti Poppe’s attempt to spin undergrounding the company’s faulty overhead lines as purely altruistic, it remains a project that the company refused to fund until forced to. A 2019 audit by the CPUC found that between 2007 and 2016, PG&E diverted more than $120 million from a program intended to help underground its overhead electric lines; not because the company had found a cheaper method but because it decided to spend the money on other programs.
So now, after not adequately funding line safety programs for years, PG&E is making lemonade out of lemons: It is gladly spending billions more to harden the state’s electrical grid, and it is using ratepayer dollars to promote the most expensive means possible — miles and miles of cable undergrounding. PG&E gets a guaranteed rate of return on these expenses, while utility experts say there are cheaper ways.
Had PG&E used that program money to replace a 100-year-old electrical tower in Butte County’s Jarbo Gap before November 2018, 83 residents of Paradise, Magalia and Yankee Hill may still be alive today.
Moreover, PG&E could have opted instead for above-ground, bare wire insulation and an infrastructure update at a lower cost to ratepayers, rather than opting for undergrounding, which ranges anywhere from $350 per foot to $1,150 per foot (roughly $1.85 million to $6.072 million per mile, according to the CPUC). Installing new overhead distribution infrastructure is much less expensive: On average, it costs between just $120-$144 per foot, or $634,000 to $760,000 per mile.
Such insult is only added to injury in a year where the utility giant has announced multiple rate hikes. The average PG&E household will pay an additional $34.50 on its monthly bill this year, and the company has requested an additional $14 per month stemming from its request to the CPUC to retroactively approve $2 billion in expenditures, dating back mostly to 2022 and 2023. For customers who get both their electricity and natural gas from PG&E, that will bring the average bill to more than $300 a month.
PG&E’s audacity clearly knows no bounds.
Pushing the cost of this advertisement — and it is clearly an advertisement, no matter how PG&E’s unscrupulous bookkeepers would seek to classify it — onto its captive customers is just another affront in a long line of PG&E’s poor decisions.
There are Many TV Ads Selling Concepts: For Example: The USPS Three Dee Animation Video This One is Especially offensive Since Trump Hired Postmaster LeJoy to Intentionally Break the Post Office so VOTE BY MAIL would not Work... (Democrats Often Used Vote by Mail)
ABOUT USPS: "As the U.S. Postal Service continues its evolution as a forward-thinking, fast-acting company capable of providing quality products and services for its customers, it continues to remember and celebrate its roots as the first national network of communications that literally bound a nation together.
Ours is a proud heritage built on a simple yet profound mission: Connect every American, every door, every business, everywhere through the simple act of delivering mail. This idea of universal service is at the heart of a $900 billion industry that drives commerce, plays an integral part of every American community and remains the greatest value of any post in the world."
Ours is a proud heritage built on a simple yet profound mission: Connect every American, every door, every business, everywhere through the simple act of delivering mail. This idea of universal service is at the heart of a $900 billion industry that drives commerce, plays an integral part of every American community and remains the greatest value of any post in the world."
But They still are Headed by a Trumpanzee that was Hired by tRUMP to Break the Mail So People Couldn't Vote for Joe Biden...
HEADLINE: Louis DeJoy: From Trump villain to Biden’s clean energy buddy...
The postmaster general has struck up an unexpected partnership with the president’s green guru, John Podesta.
https://www.politico.com/news/2023/08/13/how-louis-dejoy-went-from-democratic-nightmare-fuel-to-biden-clean-energy-player-00110945
"Chevron is Not Evil" - We are the Human Energy Company... WHAT DOES THAT EVEN MEAN? Wasn't That the Plot of the Movie The Matrix???
https://gvan42.blogspot.com/2022/02/generate-electricity-with-stationary.html
CONVERT HUMAN FAT INTO ELECTRICITY. Simply Use the Bicycle to Drive an Automobile Alternator with a Belt... Store Electricity in a Car Battery... Zero Pollution!
https://gvan42.blogspot.com/2021/11/email-peloton-ask-em-to-build-electric.html
I've noticed a LOT of CHEVRON Greenwashing Advertisements on TV Recently... All About How wonderful They Are... Just Look at the Happy People DRIVING CARS! FUN! However, On the Corporate Headquarters there are NO SOLAR PANELS on the Roof... They Run Heaters and Air Conditioners USING FOSSIL FUEL... or maybe NUCLEAR POWER from Diablo Canyon...
We Must Evolve from Energy Hunter-Gatherers to Become Energy Farmers. - Quote from SchatzLab at Humboldt State University - Arcata, California
https://gvan42.blogspot.com/2018/08/we-must-evolve-from-energy-hunter.html
https://www.commondreams.org/news/2022/09/30/viral-parody-ad-chevron-admits-it-actively-murdering-you
The fake ad was released weeks after the U.K.-based group InfluenceMap revealed that the five largest fossil fuel companies--Chevron, BP, ExxonMobil, Shell, and TotalEnergies--spend a cumulative $750 million per year on public relations campaigns to make the corporations seem committed to climate action, while spending just 12% of their capital expenditures on low-carbon activities.
READ MORE:
https://gvan42.blogspot.com/2023/04/human-energy.html
"PG&E Employs Women to Bury Power Lines" - Yes, we burned down Paradise but... Now we are Ecology Warriors! and Look! Girls Climbing Poles!
World’s operating nuclear fleet at 30 year low as new plants stall: report... The number of nuclear reactor units operating globally is at a 30 year low, while new plants struggle for investment, an industry report said on Thursday... Some 408 nuclear reactors were in operation in 31 countries as of July 2020, a decline of 9 units from mid-2019 and 30 fewer than the 2002 peak of 438, the annual World Nuclear Industry Status Report (WNISR) showed. https://www.reuters.com/article/global-nuclearpower/worlds-operating-nuclear-fleet-at-30-year-low-as-new-plants-stall-report-idUKL5N2GK2SP
ANOTHER ATOMIC DISASTER IN RUSSIA.
Nyonoksa radiation accident:
HEADLINE: DANGER ZONE - Chernobyl-style disaster fears grow as Russia finally evacuates village near nuke missile blast after massive radiation spike...
RUSSIA is to finally evacuate homes neighboring the mysterious "radiation explosion" which killed five atomic scientists and engineers - six days after the blast happened... https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/9715988/chernobyl-radiation-russia-blast-evacuation/
No Nukes!
We REALLY Need to Guard the Atomic Waste at PG&E's Abandoned Nuclear Power Plant Near Eureka California... Anyone Can Walk Right Up To The Casks and Place a Standard Bomb Under Them... Building a "Dirty Bomb."
With Insane TrumpNiks® Running Around Planting Bombs and Failing to Overthrow the US Government... This Is A REAL Threat! A Terrorist Could Walk on the Public Trail and Then We Would Have to Instantly Evacuate Eureka... For a Thousand Years... There ARE Two Chain Link Fences and a Guardhouse Protecting the Radioactive Waste from Unauthorized Visitors... So No One Can Enter Unless They Owned Wire Clippers and The Guard Was Sleeping... If There Even IS a Guard at All...
HEY! TrumpNiks® DON'T DO THIS! #MAGAKillersSUCK
It's REALLY Likely That You Will Be Arrested IF You Attempt to Visit... For ANY Reason! Even as an Internet Challenge Like #CyberPunks Do at Chernobyl.
Link to All My "No Nukes!" Gifts at Zazzle... Click Here!
The Real Solution To Problem of Atomic Energy is to Shut Down All Power Plants and Never Build any More!
F*CK YOU SHIMA!
Atomic Waste Casks at PGE Abandoned
Nuclear Power Plant Near Eureka California
Excellent Beach at King Salmon CA
Here is Where You Park...
So You Can Walk thru The OPEN GATE
and Down the Trail That Goes Along the Shore.
Google Earth - Atomic Waste in Six Casks
at PG&E Humboldt Bay Nuclear Power Plant.
Two Fences Prevent People From Entering Restricted Zone.
Theodore Kaczynski, Timothy McVey, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev and Tamerlan Tsarnaev all Built Bombs. They Did Not Have any Special Skills Like Veterans of the US Military Do. Two Bombs were Placed in Washington DC on 1/6/2021. Suspect Still Unknown.
PG&E OUGHT TO BUILD A WALL AROUND THIS NUCLEAR WASTE DUMP BEFORE THERE IS A TERRORIST ATTACK.
Read the Official Nuclear Regulatory Commission Backgrounder on "Dirty Bomb" - A Device That Uses Legal Conventional Explosives and Radioactive Material... https://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/fact-sheets/fs-dirty-bombs.html
SE SAID:
The temperature has been over 80 degrees the past couple of days. This means that my coworker has turned on the a/c in the office, and the office truly feels like a meat locker. I've got a small space heater under my desk, but it doesn't do much when the office feels like a walk-in freezer.
I will never understand why people want the inside temperature to be so uncomfortably cold. I absolutely DESPISE feeling hot, so I do like air conditioning when the weather outside is hot. But I also like the inside temperature to be comfortable. If the outside temperature is warm enough for short sleeves, then a person should also be comfortable wearing short sleeves indoors. It shouldn't be so cold indoors that you need to layer up in winter layers just to be comfortable. I always dress for the outside temperature, because at some point during the day, I'm going to be going outside. I've learned from experience that if I layer up for a freezing office and then later step outside into the heat wearing those heavy layers, I immediately feel overheated, dangerously so. So I basically have 2 options: I can layer up in winter layers for the office and bring a change of clothes with me to change into before I step out into the heat, or I can just wear seasonally-appropriate clothes to work and freeze until it's time to step out into the heat. But I hate that the logical third option of keeping the office at a comfortable temperature never seems to be an option.
I just don't get why other people like it so uncomfortably cold indoors. When my coworker works from home and I'm in the office by myself, I often don't turn on the a/c at all because I don't need it. But if I DO turn it on, usually the office cools down quickly, so I turn the a/c off after 5 minutes. This is also how I typically do it at home. I don't WANT to have to be bundled up in my own house, so I like it to get cool enough to be comfortable, but not so cold as to be UNcomfortable. And at night after the sun sets, I prefer to open the windows and let in the fresh, cool outside air instead of running the a/c.
I think I'm going to buy a larger space heater for my office this weekend.
GN REPLIED:
When I worked in an office in Sacramento years ago, it was refreshing to come inside to a cold office after being outside. We had to go to different state agencies several times every day, we took turns, and we preferred to walk because parking issues. So we’d usually be pretty warm when we got back. But after a while we would cool down, and it was actually cold in there.
I brought in my “office sweater,” and just left it on my chair. It was a sort of bulky oversized cotton cardigan in a boring color. I’d take it home for laundering every so often. Small office, and we knew each other really well, so that sweater made its rounds! I left it behind when I quit, who knows, maybe it’s still there!
I highly recommend an office sweater, and maybe a little lap blanket for under the desk if you need to get your legs cozy!
When I worked in an office in Sacramento years ago, it was refreshing to come inside to a cold office after being outside. We had to go to different state agencies several times every day, we took turns, and we preferred to walk because parking issues. So we’d usually be pretty warm when we got back. But after a while we would cool down, and it was actually cold in there.
I brought in my “office sweater,” and just left it on my chair. It was a sort of bulky oversized cotton cardigan in a boring color. I’d take it home for laundering every so often. Small office, and we knew each other really well, so that sweater made its rounds! I left it behind when I quit, who knows, maybe it’s still there!
I highly recommend an office sweater, and maybe a little lap blanket for under the desk if you need to get your legs cozy!
and then SE Said:
I totally know what you mean. Walking into an air-conditioned office feels GREAT after being out in the heat. And sometimes when it's REALLY hot, like 90+, I'm perfectly comfortable with the a/c blasting inside, and I can even wear short sleeves without a sweater and be perfectly comfortable all day. But most of the time, the a/c feels great when I first arrive, but after about 30 minutes or so I begin to feel chilled to the bone. Like, right now my hands are so cold, they're like ice. I ALWAYS have a hoodie with me at work because of my tendency to get cold. I would never come to work without one. But most of the time, I STILL feel cold even with a hoodie on and a space heater under my desk. It literally feels like I'm sitting in a walk-in freezer and trying to counteract the freezing temps with a tiny space heater and a hoodie, and it's just not enough. I could REALLY layer up like I do in the winter, but that seems so extreme when the outside temp is 80...and like I said in my post, I would have to bring an entire change of clothes to change into before going home if I do that, and that's such a hassle. I just wish other people liked the temerature to be comfortable: not hot, but not cold either. Just comfortable in a short-sleeved shirt. I don't think that's unreasonable.On a different subject...
PD SAID:
Here’s a brief rundown of the 9 stages I go through in writing a book:1. I’m exhilarated by the birth of a new idea. It flows like honey off the tip of my pen and onto my notebook.
2. I read over what I’ve written. (Big mistake.)
3. I change a few things here and there.
4. I start obsessing over it.
5. Rewrite after agonizing rewrite, I pander to my lord and master, the hypothetical reader, methodically wringing out every vestige of spontaneity until the original joy of creation devolves into utter misery.
6. I abandon it.
7. Sooner or later, I come back with a fresh eye and a new perspective and get excited about it all over again, resolving this time to keep it simple and fun, and to get it DONE.
8. Fail.
9. Fed up, I gather together enough stuff I’ve written to make a book of a respectable spine thickness (I shoot for about 3/8 inch), not giving a flip whether it’s any good or not. I just want it out of my life.
Ta-da!
And yet, for all this misery, there are people who seem to enjoy these books I write.
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