Edison says it will fund firefighting assets and beef up hot spot monitoring, in plan to reduce wildfire risk

Under legal scrutiny over its possible role in the Eaton fire in January, Southern California Edison on Friday released its long-range plan to reduce wildfire risks caused by its equipment.

The ethree-year plan, at a cost of $6.2 billion, includes what SCE says is an additional 440 circuit miles of covered conductor line and at minimum 260 circuit miles of underground power distribution lines, according to the plan, which the Rosemead-based utility submitted to the Office of Energy Infrastructure Safety on Friday.

Company officials also said the plan aligns with the state’s beefed up efforts, which include aerial firefighting assets throughout the company’s service area. Part of the plan includes SCE funding such assets.

“We developed our three-year plan with a layered defense strategy to help safeguard our communities against wildfire threats,” said Steven Powell, president and CEO of SCE, in its announcement. “The heartbreaking January wildfires in Southern California underscore the importance and urgency in advancing mitigations and using new tools to increase infrastructure resiliency and safety. While wildfire risk can never be fully eliminated, we continue to harden the grid and invest in innovative approaches to bring us as close to zero as possible.”

That hardening includes technology that quickly detects ground faults and limits voltage when a line contacts the ground; use of artificial intelligence and machine learning that SCE says would improve inspections of the grid while homing in on maintenance needs; use of satellite imagery for more effective vegetation management around its equipment; more lines underground; and many more monitors that would help detect failures sooner.

The plan also calls for more communication with customers over public safety power shutoffs (PSPS – when the utility temporarily shuts off power to your neighborhood for public safety reasons), more inspections and trimming vegetation that could contact lines.

Powell said the mitigation strategy is evolving as the utility balances costs, safety and technology.

The $6 billion plan comes as the company’s shareholders brace for what could be expensive costs related to possible liability for the Eaton fire, which destroyed more than 9,000 structures and left 18 dead in Altadena and its surrounding communities.

Last month, Pedro Pizarro, the CEO of SCE’s parent company Edison, acknowledged to investors that the Rosemead-based utility’s equipment could have ignited the Eaton fire. The company likely would suffer significant financial losses if found liable, given that no other potential cause of the blaze has been identified, he said.

More than 130 lawsuits have been filed blaming SCE’s equipment for sparking the fire, through an idle transmission line that potentially became re-energized after more than 50 years.

Since the early aftermath of the Eaton fire, SCE’s equipment — in particular its transmission towers and lines in the foothills above Altadena — has been a suspected ignition point for the fire, which driven by extreme winds exploded across Altadena and parts of Pasadena and Sierra Madre in early January.

The lawsuits contend that sparks from the lines or current from an exposed grounding wire made contact with the brush. They also criticize SCE for not de-energizing all the power lines in Eaton Canyon after the utility was warned days ahead that powerful winds were coming.

SCE has said it is conducting a “comprehensive review” of the data collected from the system in coordination with third-party experts, and “will move forward as quickly as possible in analyzing results.”

The towers and lines at issue in the case have been moved to a storage area where they are being preserved as evidence.

Potential liability has raised concerns over the viability of the $21 billion state wildfire insurance fund, set up to cover claims over fires started by a utility’s equipment.

In April, Pizarro said it was unclear how much money would be used up from the fund to address Eaton fire claims, as multiple investigations continue into the cause.

If the fire is linked to Edison infrastructure, it could take up a sizable chunk, he added.

On Friday, the utility couched its plan in the context of innovation.

“SCE’s wildfire mitigation strategy continues to evolve as we balance cost, reliability and safety while pioneering innovative technologies to protect communities from wildfire risks,” Powell said in a statement.