Image art by Paul Gerke via ChatGPT 4o.
At this week’s annual meeting of the Western Conference of Public Service Commissioners, one topic took precedence over the rest: wildfire risk. Investment analysts warn that high-risk wildfires pose a threat to the financial health of the utility sector in Western states, where liability exposure is already impacting access to capital.
Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) understands all too well.
Lawsuits following the 2018 Camp Fire and 2021 Dixie Fire drove the California utility into bankruptcy. The PG&E that emerged from the ashes has made wildfire safety a top priority, as outlined in its 2026-2028 Wildfire Mitigation Plan (WMP).
“Pacific Gas and Electric Company remains steadfast in our stand that catastrophic wildfires shall stop,” the document reads in part. “Our 2026-2028 Wildfire Mitigation Plan highlights this focus as we strive to stay ahead of the increasing wildfire risk facing California. Our primary goal for the WMP is to execute on our comprehensive strategy to reduce ignitions by implementing mitigations designed to minimize the likelihood of catastrophic wildfires, while also maintaining the reliability of the electric system and limiting disruptions to customers arising from our wildfire mitigation efforts.”
As PG&E prepares for peak wildfire season in California, the utility’s research and development facility, the Applied Technology Services lab, is sharing some of the layers of protection it has implemented to prevent wildfire disasters. These measures have been successful in preventing a major wildfire within PG&E’s territory in each of the last two years.
“Rather than being reactive to conditions, our wildfire work proactively protects and prevents wildfire. We’re keeping our system safe while we build resilience for the future. This work is essential in light of extreme weather and extended wildfire seasons,” said PG&E Wildfire Mitigation Vice President Andy Abranches.
The Tools in PG&E’s Wildfire Resilience Toolkit
Like some of its peers, PG&E is now using artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning to monitor wildfire conditions, the utility reports. It has also increased grid resilience with layers of protection, including:
- Undergrounding Powerlines: This permanently eliminates ignition risk in some high-risk areas. PG&E has undergrounded approximately 915 miles of power lines since 2021 and plans to have nearly 1,600 total miles of power lines underground by the end of 2026.
- Overhead System Upgrades: Including the installation of strengthened power poles and covered power lines. These upgrades are expected to reduce wildfire ignition risk by nearly 67% upon completion. PG&E has completed more than 1,430 miles of overhead system upgrades since 2018 and plans to complete nearly 1,900 total miles of system upgrades by the end of 2026.
- Situational Awareness Improvements: Including the deployment of a state-wide network of nearly 1,600 weather stations, of which 1,400 are AI and machine learning enabled, and more than 650 high-definition wildfire cameras. The AI-enabled cameras process data and provide automated wildfire notifications, improving response times.
- Enhanced Powerline Safety Settings (EPSS): These automatically turn off power within one-tenth of a second, or faster, if a wildfire hazard is detected. Such settings protect 1.8 million PG&E customers in areas with elevated or extreme wildfire risk. In 2024, these settings contributed to a more than 65% reduction in reportable ignitions compared to the 2018-2020 average. More than half of customers protected by EPSS did not experience a power outage while EPSS was enabled in 2024, and the average duration of outages on an EPSS-enabled circuit decreased by 17% from the prior two-year average.
- Vegetation Management: Programs continue to evolve using a data-driven, risk-informed approach to help reduce both outages and potential ignitions caused by vegetation contacting PG&E’s equipment. Over the past five years, PG&E has inspected, trimmed, or removed more than 960,000 trees and other types of vegetation in our service area.
- Drone inspections: These provide a more efficient bird’s-eye view of assets from the ground and air.
- Public Safety Power Shutoffs (PSPS): A last resort during extreme weather conditions to reduce the risk of catastrophic fire. PG&E’s experienced meteorologists use cutting-edge weather models to forecast wildfire risk at a granular level, determining the transmission and distribution circuits that will be de-energized.
Detect Earlier, Extinguish Faster
PG&E is committed to supporting a pipeline of new research, development, and innovation to address climate-driven wildfire challenges.
A competition called XPRIZE Wildfire encourages teams from around the world to innovate around a wide range of firefighting technologies across two complementary tracks designed to transform how potentially catastrophic fires are detected, managed, and suppressed. PG&E is the co-title sponsor of XPRIZE Wildfire, along with the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation.
“For 30 years, XPRIZE has spurred innovation to address the world’s most pressing challenges. In 2023, we launched XPRIZE Wildfire with a goal to end destructive wildfires,” said XPRIZE Wildfire Program Director Andrea Santy. “Today, we have an incredible global cohort of dozens of teams making monumental strides towards developing solutions to reach this audacious goal.”
One of the Bay Area teams showcased this year was Palo Alto-based Ember Guard, a cross-disciplinary team led by Ahvish Roy, founder of ARX, and supported by Sangram Ganguly, Chief Technology Officer of Rhombus Power. It uses deep learning along with AI to produce a scalable cloud-based high-resolution wildfire model that forecasts the likely propagation and intensity of a wildfire so that firefighters can prioritize their limited resources.
Also participating was Alameda-based Rain, which recently showcased autonomous wildfire suppression technology in California. A Black Hawk helicopter equipped with wildfire mission autonomy from Rain and MATRIX™ autonomy technology from Sikorsky, a Lockheed Martin company, conducted a demonstration of a wide range of wildfire response missions and tasks, including finding and suppressing early-stage wildfires, all commanded via tablet. Rain is a participant in the Electric Program Investment Charge program, a research and development project.
