PG&E undergrounding project could potentially benefit with co-location of distribution fiber conduit

Planting wires underground is one of the most expensive wildfire-risk strategies any utility can undertake — and it remains to be seen if the $25 billion estimate is high enough to cover the entire 10,000 miles that are to be placed underground in the areas deemed at most risk to wildfire across PG&E’s territory. The price tag is based on PG&E’s belief that it can do the job for $2.5 million per mile. Yet PG&E plans to spend $3.75 million per mile this year, when it expects to complete 175 miles of work. And in a white paper published four years ago, PG&E said underground work costs $3 million per mile.

Nonetheless, Chief Executive Patti Poppe said she’s confident that as the project ramps up, economies of scale and new technologies will bring costs into line. The utility expects to be planting 1,200 miles a year underground by 2026. “We can dramatically reduce our costs every year,” she said on a conference call with Wall Street investment analysts. “With scale, we can improve the unit costs.” 

CA utility PG&E says underground wire project will cost $25B | The Sacramento Bee

PG&E could potentially gain additional economies of scale by partnering with local governments, utility districts and consumer utility cooperatives to co-locate fiber conduit as it buries its electric lines. PG&E is prioritizing areas of its mostly Northern California service territory where wildfire risk is the highest. 

These areas also have major telecommunications infrastructure deficiencies. Residents and businesses would doubly benefit from both reduced risk of wildfires sparked by overhead electrical distribution lines as well as access to fiber delivered advanced telecom services.

Such a partnership would also potentially benefit PG&E by speeding up its burial of electric distribution lines, demonstrating good faith effort to regulators. The partners could also potentially tap into funding in the recently enacted federal Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act that appropriates funds for electrical infrastructure improvements as well as advanced telecommunications infrastructure.