Damaged Power Lines Blamed for Wildfires

A series of wildfires in San Diego County in late October burned more than 207,000 acres. Improperly maintained power lines were blamed for three of the fires.

By RANDAL C. ARCHIBOLD
Published: September 3, 2008

LOS ANGELES — A new report by state regulators has blamed improperly maintained power lines by two companies, one of which impeded investigators, for some of the most devastating wildfires in Southern California last year.

California Public Utilities Commission Report (PDF) The report, by investigators for the California Public Utilities Commission, concurs with the findings of the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, known as Calfire, which in July said damaged lines were to blame for three of the most destructive fires, all in San Diego County. The three fires, among the most severe of several wind-fed blazes in late October, burned more than 207,000 acres, destroyed 1,141 homes, damaged scores of others, killed 2 people and injured 40 firefighters

The commission plans to review the findings and could impose financial penalties against the two companies, San Diego Gas & Electric and Cox Communications, which investigators said failed to adequately maintain lines at the site of the Guejito, Witch and Rice fires.

The report said the Guejito fire started when an improperly maintained Cox line came into contact with a San Diego Gas & Electric conductor. The Witch fire was attributed to two of the utility’s lines coming into contact, and the Rice fire began when a sycamore tree limb, which investigators suggested should have been trimmed, fell onto a utility line.

The report said San Diego Gas & Electric delayed access to witnesses, sites and other evidence, and it suggested that the commission consider ordering all utilities to provide immediate access to scenes under investigation.

“The S.D.G. & E. representative refused to answer specific questions about the fire/incident and informed me that he was only available to show me the site,” an inspector wrote of his visit to the scene of one of the fires.

The utility subsequently answered questions after its lawyers and those from the commission discussed the problem.

Both companies denounced the report as riddled with inaccuracies and said thin or misleading evidence led to premature or baseless conclusions.

“This report,” San Diego Gas & Electric said, “is full of speculation and faulty conclusions, with sparse evidence — if any — to support its claims.”

The utility said the report played down the significance of what it considered unusually strong wind for the area. It also said that the clearance of the tree in the Rice fire complied with state regulations and that Calfire had not yet determined why the power lines in the Witch fire came into contact.

Cox suggested that unusually fierce winds, not its maintenance, caused problems with its line.

“The evidence indicates that our line was fully intact prior to the extreme Santa Ana winds, which caused S.D.G. & E.’s lines and our lines to come into contact,” the Cox statement said. “Cox has cooperated fully with all agencies during this process; staff statements in the report are inconsistent with the facts.”

In June, the City of San Diego filed a lawsuit against San Diego Gas & Electric, blaming the utility for the fires and seeking damages. Michael Aguirre, the city attorney, said Tuesday that he would add Cox to the lawsuit, in light of the commission report.

Downed power lines cause about 2 percent or 3 percent of wildfires in California but have been behind some of the largest, in part because the lines sit on high towers traversing remote, windy and hard-to-access terrain.

Elected officials and others have called for lines to be buried.

After a downed power line was cited as the cause of a fire in Malibu in October, Zev Yaroslavsky, a member of the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors who represents the area, repeated a call for utilities and fire safety experts to examine ways to avert power line dangers, including burying the lines in high-risk zones.

Such a step, Mr. Yaroslavsky conceded, would be expensive. A study two years ago by the Edison Electric Institute, an industry group, estimated that putting existing lines underground cost on average about $1 million per mile, with rate payers bearing much of the expense. In addition, while underground lines are more reliable and reduce wildfire hazards, they are also more difficult and costly to maintain.

San Diego Gas & Electric said it had been taking steps to reduce the danger, including replacing hundreds of wood poles with metal ones in the backcountry.