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As a second aside, I wonder how much of the PG&E outages were due to deferred tree trimming and deferred maintenance that made a the results of a bad storm even worse.

I have seen no evidence of this. In fact, things have improved over the last few years. If anything, stupid environmental rules remain the biggest problem governing tree trimming.

About that I could go on at length.

I have seen no evidence of this. In fact, things have improved over the last few years.

I am not in PG&E's Service Territory, so you could be correct. PG&E was in bankruptcy. If it was not deferring maintenance, I am amazed. I know several Pacific Northwest utilities that are deferring wood power pole replacements and tree triming that would suffer a really huge problem after a major storm. These utilities have cost problems but are no where near bankruptcy. I was speculationg based, but if I am wrong, I apologize.

I tip my hat to the enlightened management of PG&E for their continued maitenance if they that is what happened.