After the wildfires, PG&E is implementing a policy of shutting down the electricity and threatening to do it for as long as 1 week when there are high winds and high temperatures causing extreme fire danger. I don't see how they could get away with keeping the electricity off that long (Northern Californians are already pretty pissed at them for wanting to raise the rates to cover the billions of dollars of damage from the fires their downed lines caused), but even for a few days it would be devastating.
Besides the fact that I can't run my business without electricity and make a living and we'd lose all of our perishable food, my biggest worry is the CPAP. I only have to fall asleep for a few minutes without it to know I still have severe apnea and absolutely need it (how did I survive before CPAP???).
Today PG&E reps were going door to door to collect some data and told us that I am eligible for the medical baseline discount. She also said that they will keep our electricity on during a planned safety outage. I don't see how that could possibly be true, but we will see. All the website promises is that I will get advanced warning of a planned outage (well, duh, shouldn't they warn everyone???). When we lived on the Big Island of Hawaii there were rolling blackouts. They always announced the time so we could plan ahead, and we would simply arrange to have our dinner ready in time for a candelight dinner since the outages were only an hour or so (we were newlyweds and it was very romantic
) But days and days??? OY!I've been thinking if they really turn our electricity off for days I'll have to go stay in a motel in another town to use my cpap and computer. I don't really want to do a generator, maybe I'll consider a camping battery but I'd still have to go out of town to charge it up.
