Rural California Utility Asks To Raise Power Rates By More Than Half As Wildfire Costs Pile Up In Newsom’s State

A utility serving rural Northern California wants power rates to climb by more than half as wildfire costs mount under Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom.

Pacific Power, which serves the state’s far northern corner, asked the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) on Nov. 6 to raise its rates by 57 percent beginning Jan. 1, 2027, its application shows. The company’s website says that a 14 percent decrease, which also takes effect Jan. 1, will partially offset the hike.

The company’s filing cites the cost of wildfire work, like trimming trees and strengthening lines, as well as insurance and inflation. Pacific Power told Jefferson Public Radio (JPR) that the change would add about $120 to customers’ bills each month.

“The $120 number does not account for the 14% decrease related to lower than expected power costs,” Simon Gutierrez, a Pacific Power communications representative, said in a statement to the Daily Caller News Foundation.

“Not only is the fire risk extreme, but our service area is very sparsely populated,” Gutierrez told JPR. “It means fewer customers to spread the costs of these investments.”

Pacific Power has about 46,000 California customers, scattered over a service area topping 11,000 square miles in Siskiyou, Del Norte, Modoc and Shasta counties, according to the filing. Gutierrez told JPR that it comes to roughly four customers for each square mile.

The company’s website touts the work it has done since 2022: more than 300 miles of line covered and reinforced, and over 7,000 wooden poles replaced with steel or fiberglass.

In all, Pacific Power is seeking about $103.4 million more, the filing shows. Residential rates would rise 56.9 percent under the request.

Some of the money would pay back wildfire and insurance costs Pacific Power has been running up. The company expects to have about $93.8 million in wildfire mitigation costs and $11.1 million in insurance premiums on its books by the end of 2026 that current rates don’t cover, the filing says. It’s asking to collect that across six years instead of all at once.