PG&E should be fined $166M for botched power shut-offs, watchdog says
Utilities are in a thankless position. Everyone wants rock-bottom low rates, but also wants 100% solar, distribution lines in their neighborhood buried underground, and every new development in the middle of the wilderness supplied with reliable power at the same price paid by people in dense city apartments. Major infrastructure is near universally well past its designed end-of-life across the United States, but no one wants to pay for replacing it. Poor people complain, rich homeowners complain, state legislature complains and blames the utility for all the woes of the state, environmentalists complain, anti and pro nuke advocates complain, the newspapers publishes idiotic articles written by journalists with no idea what they&#x27;re talking about bashing the utility, every dollar spent is scrutinized at length, but at the end of the day everyone expects the lights to come on like magic whatever the weather or demand is like and doesn&#x27;t even think about it.<p>Everyone always thinks there is some grand nefarious plot in play out to fraudulently overcharge them, suppress solar power, or emit mind control waves into their brain, but the system is really just the result of all the many demands placed on it by many different and frequently opposed interests. Generally they understand their role is to &quot;play the bad guy&quot; and be a foil for politicians to look good in public by standing up to a big bad villain. At least in my experience, a utility is a big boring company full of people doing their best to provide their customers with reliable service given whatever constraints are put on them.