Loan or Bailout: Biden-Harris Admin ‘Loans’ Pacific Gas & Electric $15B to Combat Climate Change

The Biden-Harris administration will provide a stunning $15 billion bailout “loan” to Pacific Gas & Electric “to support the utility’s efforts to combat climate change and improve the power grid.”

Climate change. In 2019, the Globe reported that instead of spending on crucial infrastructure, PG&E was spending $2.4 billion annually on a legislative mandate to buy renewable power.

“The funds would support a portfolio of projects to expand hydropower generation and battery storage, upgrade transmission capacity, and enable virtual power plants throughout PG&E’s service area, the energy department said,” the AP reports.

Even in 2019 lawmakers knew California’s renewable energy mandate was nonsense. Assemblyman James Gallagher (R-Yuba City) said every dollar spent on the additional cost of renewable energy is one dollar that is not available to be spent on vegetation management, line insulation, “undergrounding” lines, and other grid-hardening measures.  “Dollars spent on forestry management have been found to do more to reduce carbon than other measures. Science shows that redirecting funding to forestry management gets us a better bang for our buck in carbon reduction,” said Gallagher.

Instead, California Democrats killed Gallagher’s proposal and doubled down on climate change drivel.

The loan from the federal government “will help PG&E meet forecasted load growth increase electric reliability, and reduce costs for its consumers across California,” the DOE loan office said.

Will this loan really “reduce costs for its consumers across California?”

“As part of the Biden-Harris Administration’s Investing in America agenda, the U.S. Department of Energy’s Loan Programs Office (LPO) announced a conditional commitment for a loan guarantee of up to $15 billion to Pacific Gas & Electric Company (PG&E), a combined natural gas and electric utility serving Northern and Central California,” the DOE said. “The loan guarantee for PG&E’s Project Polaris will support a portfolio of projects to expand hydropower generation and battery storage, upgrade transmission capacity through reconductoring and grid enhancing technologies, and enable virtual power plants throughout PG&E’s service area. These infrastructure investments will help PG&E meet forecasted load growth, increase electric reliability, and reduce costs for its consumers across California.”

But this caveat in the DOE loan announcement is concerning:

PG&E will partner with the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) Local 1245 to train and employ members of underserved groups interested in operational roles through its existing PowerPathway program. Currently, approximately two-thirds of PG&E employees are covered by collective bargaining agreements with unions. At full deployment, PG&E’s investments are expected to support thousands of on-going construction and operations jobs.

It’s really just a labor union shakedown.

and

“…borrowers meaningfully engage with community and labor stakeholders to create good-paying, high-quality jobs and improve the well-being of the local community and workers. In its CBP, PG&E plans to expand its outreach programs to boost engagement and deliver community benefits in partnership with key stakeholders, including local governments, Native American Tribes, community-based organizations, and low-and-middle income customers. PG&E has committed to locate many projects in disadvantaged communities, as identified by the Climate and Economic Justice Screening Tool.”

Don’t do it PG&E – it’s a ludicrous jobs program for climate “justice,” which will only serve to increase utility rates. All of the highlighted language is nothing more than nonsensical obstructions to the primary purpose of delivering electricity to Californians.

“Among California’s investor-owned utilities — Pacific Gas & Electric, Southern California Edison, and San Diego Gas & Electric — electricity rates have gone up by as much as 110% in the last decade, and more than 50% just in the last three years,” Energy Central reports.

“PG&E customers saw four rate hikes this year, and face some of the highest electric bills in the nation.”

“This loan is less a solution for California’s energy future and more a bailout for PG&E,” said Ken Cook, president of Environmental Working Group.

With Gov. Newsom’s push for an all-electric energy grid by 2045, energy demand in the state is projected to increase by up to 76%. If PG&E is borrowing $15 billion right now to make this happen, just imagine how much it will cost the utility and rate payers in 2045.