Hill Fights PG&E Proposal to Pass Pipeline Safety Costs to Ratepayers

Assemblyman Jerry Hill today urged state utility regulators to take action on a plan PG&E recently announced that could potentially make ratepayers pay most of the cost for modernizing the company's pipeline system. 

Hill, D-San Mateo, spoke at the California Public Utilities Commission meeting in San Francisco in protest of a in August in the wake of last year's San Bruno pipeline explosion to enhance electronic monitoring and install automatic shutoff valves, among other changes, on its pipelines. The upgrades would cost about $2.2 billion, with ratepayers picking up 90 percent of the tab, Hill said. 

"This is absurd from a company that makes a billion dollars in profit each year and paid its outgoing CEO a $35 million golden parachute," he told the five-member commission. 

Hill urged the CPUC to reduce the 11.35 percent rate of return the company is expected to gain from the proposed work. 

"It's time to rethink the paradigm used to set a rate of return for utilities," Hill added. 

Because Hill's comments were made under public comment, no immediate action will be taken on his suggestion. However, a CPUC spokesman said the commission will likely take into consideration his proposal as part of its ongoing process to set new rules for safely operating natural gas pipelines throughout the state.