Redding Electric Utility will soon present its formalized wildfire mitigation plan to the City Council for approval.
While “that doesn’t necessarily mean that we will be shutting off power … legislation is changing that’s requiring us to look at our wildfire mitigation plan and updating it, should we have to move to that,” said Heather Gustafsen, REU project coordinator-technical.
The plan is expected to reach the council in the next few weeks, said Gustafsen.
REU builds and maintains Redding’s power network, serving a 60-mile area with about 45,000 customers, about 90% of them residential, the company said. The city of Redding owns the company.
There’s nothing in place right now that governs when REU will turn off power “in a public safety power shutoff scenario, as a true PSPS,” said Gusafsen.
So called “public safety power shutoffs,” or PSPS, temporarily turn off power to specific areas to reduce the risk of fires caused by an electric company’s equipment.
What’s driving adoption of formalized PSPS rules
Having such PSPS programs are becoming more mainstream after Pacific Gas and Electric Co. filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection after a federal court found the utility giant liable for a series of forest fires from 2015 to to 2018 due to sparking lines and poorly maintained infrastructure, according to a 2024 report from industry research provider BloombergNEF.
PG&E paid out more than $5.3 billion in settlements and was required to invest heavily in upgraded transmission and distribution equipment, as well as monitoring systems, the report said.
As part of the city’s existing wildfire mitigation plan, REU could preemptively take action should the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration weather agency issue a Red Flag warning indicating higher wildfire threat conditions.
Current efforts to help protect the city should fire risk escalate to Red Flag warning status could include deploying more staff to patrol power lines for trouble and boosting coordination with other departments “to make sure everybody’s ready for anything that could happen. It puts us to a higher level of awareness and better able to respond,” said Gustafsen.
So far, the agency has not intentionally shut off power to Redding residents for a PSPS event, she said. For several years, there have been alert levels that activate depending on the local temperature, wind speed and humidity levels.
REU can already temporarily switch power off quickly and then back on if something connects with the power line but causes no damage. Should repairs be needed, the electricity would remain off until any repairs are completed.
And just because an alert level is announced doesn’t mean REU will turn off power, though: “Those don’t correlate,” said Gustafson.
“We hope that we never have to turn off power, but if it were to ever happen, citizens will have communication and they’ll be aware of what our plan is and what the thresholds are. It will come as no surprise and there will be warnings,” Gustafson said.
Laying the groundwork for potential power shutoffs in Redding
Redding Electric Utility began laying the groundwork a year ago to be able to preemptively cut power to some areas if wildfire-prone weather conditions arose and prompted red flag warnings.
The city-owned agency analyzed 20 years of wildfire and weather data to determine which parts of Redding would most likely need to be covered by possible preemptive power cutoffs, REU’s Assistant Director of Transmission and Distribution Nathan Aronson told the Redding City Council during its meeting on May 20, 2025.
About 5% of REU’s customers could be in areas that are historically more susceptible to fire danger, making power shutoffs to stop electricity transmission more likely there, he told the council.
The west side of Redding, much of it devastated during the Carr Fire during the summer of 2019, would likely be included among REU’s higher-risk areas.
“We don’t have to add it, but we believe it is prudent utility practice,” Aronson said about the agency’s pursuit of the ability to enact preemptive power shutoffs. “As these fires keep burning and utilities keep saying ‘wow, we wish we would’ve thought of that ahead of time,’ we think it’s prudent to have a plan in place. It’s better to have a plan and then have a really scary event and not have a plan in place.”Last year, Aronson said: “Our insurance companies are asking for it. Our joint power agencies that we’re a part of are asking for it. The (California) Wildfire Safety Advisory Board is starting to ask us a lot of questions about it. Even our credit rating agencies are asking us about it. So it’s really become much more common practice and so we’re trying to get in front of it.”
Michele Chandler covers public safety, reports on trials in Shasta County Superior Court, writes about restaurants and foodies and handles whatever else comes up for the Redding Record Searchlight/USA Today Network. Accepts story tips at 530-338-7753 and at mrchandler@gannett.com. Please support our entire newsroom’s commitment to public service journalism by subscribing today.
This article originally appeared on Redding Record Searchlight: Redding Electric Utility finalizing power shutoff plan
Reporting by Michele Chandler, Redding Record Searchlight / Redding Record Searchlight
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