PG&E’s Criminal Probation to End Amid Ongoing Safety Worries

Associated PressPublished: January 24, 2022

FILE PHOTO: SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA - FEBRUARY 07: A Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E) truck sits at the scene of a three-alarm fire that started after a construction crew hit a gas line on February 07, 2019 in San Francisco, California. Construction crews continue to clean up a day after a three-alarm fire broke out when a construction crew punctured a gas line while digging with a backhoe on Geary Boulevard. The three-story tall flame that burned from the pipe damaged five building. No injuries were reported. (Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

By MICHAEL LIEDTKE, AP Business Writer

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — The nation's largest utility, Pacific Gas & Electric, is poised to emerge from five years of criminal probation amid worries that it remains too dangerous to be trusted.

Over the last five years, the utility became an even more destructive force.

More than 100 people have died and more than 23,000 homes and businesses have been incinerated in wildfires sparked by its equipment in that time.

The probation period was supposed to rehabilitate PG&E after its 2016 felony conviction for a 2010 explosion that blew up a neighborhood and killed eight people.

PG&E says it has made strides in fixing outdated equipment and pledges to do more.

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Filed Under: utilities

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