When a dentist is administering a shot of novocaïne, they will typically palm the syringe and move in from the side of the patient’s head so that the patient will not see the needle coming and grow apprehensive about the pain of the injection. PG&E seems to employ a similar approach, although the result is far from painless.
In the Oct. 16 edition of this paper, the trustees of the San Luis Coastal Unified School District published a piece demanding that PG&E continue paying the $10 million per year unitary tax (“These are complicated times, but our message is simple: PG&E should keep funding the school district”). The payment was discontinued due to the scheduled decommissioning of the Diablo Canyon nuclear plant and the reduced value of the closing facility. The county has already received around $85 million for the closure but apparently has already burned through it.
A number of the district’s needs are listed, such as pension and retirement costs, and the state-mandated transitional kindergarten program, and as an offset for the loss of COVID funds, which it used to hire 173 additional staffers that the district had somehow managed without before the pandemic. No reason is given for how these costs are somehow caused by or attributable to the Diablo Canyon plant or to PG&E, other than the fact that it has been receiving these funds in the past and would sure like to continue receiving them.
There is a human tendency to see the assets of others as somehow being available to meet our own needs, and from there it is just a short step to finding a reason that we are entitled to them.
This tax would ultimately be paid by electricity ratepayers, which is pretty much all of us. This would be in addition to the many other charges that PG&E and the state already impose.
The prospect of yet another increase in my utility bills left me sputtering in fiscal indignation, and out of macabre curiosity I decided to take a look at my PG&E bill. A career of plowing through impenetrable lawyerly prose served me well in steeling my nerves for this undertaking, but provided little help in making sense of it all.
Ultimately, it appeared to me that only between roughly one-fourth to one-third of my PG&E charges are for the electricity actually used, while the remaining balance is for “electric delivery charges.” These are broken down to various individual charges, programs, and taxes, such as the one proposed here. I imagine that everyone has a similar electricity/delivery ratio.
I heat my home and water with gas, as well as cook and run a dryer. Gas used to be my major energy expense, with electricity substantially less, but now my gas charges are far less than my electrical charges. My subjective, anecdotal impression is the that the ratios have reversed. I imagine that others share my experience.
In an era in which we seek to discourage fossil fuel use to combat climate change, and to encourage the conversion to electrical power, do we really want to make electricity more and more expensive?
Like the cunning dentist, or the squid as he flees predators through his inky cloud, the calculations on the statement, a vacillating jumble of charges, credits, and abbreviations, seem designed to conceal and confuse, while still satisfying the disclosure requirements. Like most ratepayers, I usually just cut to the “pay this amount” portion, and whimper as I write a check. I then inform our cat that he will be on still shorter rations of his already meager servings of the heavily discounted Sea Floor Surprise faux fish that Grocery Outlet found to be otherwise unsellable.
How many of the expenses in PG&E “delivery charges” are really necessary? Obviously, paying the crews that go out in storms and restore the power is necessary, as is constructing and maintaining the transmission lines. But is, say, the PG&E Energy Education Center on Ontario Road really necessary? Or are the expenditures for ads and public relations necessary for a monopoly? Other programs? I began to suspect that the energy subsidies to low-income households are often abused when I once noticed an elderly neighbor running their air conditioner in mid-70 degree weather, instead of going to the trouble of opening a window. I suspect that there are a lot of charges, including this proposed unitary tax, that could be eliminated without compromising electrical service.
As you may have noticed with a real estate transaction, any time you are dealing with large amounts in an unfamiliar process, there is a tendency to “lard up” the costs with excessive and unnecessary charges, since they will often escape notice due to the overall size and complexity of the transaction. But as our PG&E bills show, they add up.
Our energy expenses deserve a closer look. Another $10 million per year is a step in the wrong direction. ∆
John Donegan is a retired attorney and cheapskate in Pismo Beach who misses the chance to check the coin return slots in pay phones for found change. To respond with an opinion for publication, email it to letters@newtimesslo.com.
This article appears in Pets 2025.
