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Fallen electric power lines are believed to be responsible for causing some of America's deadliest wildfires, from Lahaina in Hawaii last year to California's 2018 Camp Fire. So utility companies have started shutting off power lines to prevent fires. In Colorado, an investigation into one such electricity shut-off found problems with that, too. Rachel Cohen of the Mountain West News Bureau has this report.
RACHEL COHEN, BYLINE: In December of 2021, ferocious winds kicked up quickly in the suburbs of Boulder, Colorado. A rare winter grass fire roared into an urban firestorm, as reported by local ABC TV affiliate Denver7.
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UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER #1: It is dry. It is extraordinarily windy. Hurricane-force winds up there, and...
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UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER #2: Making it Colorado's most destructive wildfire in just a matter of hours.
COHEN: More than 1,000 homes were lost. Hundreds of lawsuits followed. Investigators blamed in part a sagging power line, but the electric company Xcel Energy denies that. Still, this past April, when extreme winds were predicted again, Xcel did something different. It switched off some of its power lines, a public safety power shut-off. The shut-off started in California. But now they're spreading to more states, from Hawaii to Texas to Idaho. Xcel's proactive shut-off in April was the first in Colorado. Fifty-five thousand customers lost power, some for several days. By many accounts, it did not go well. Eighty-year-old Jo Ferguson lives at a Boulder senior living facility.
JO FERGUSON: There's my CPAP and my oxygen.
COHEN: She uses those machines to breathe at night and, when the power went out, had to sleep without them for one night, before getting an extra-long extension cord to reach backup power in the hallway.
FERGUSON: Leaving us in a vulnerable position without forewarning and forearming us I think is unconscionable.
COREY DRAGGE: It was hectic, to say the least.
COHEN: Corey Dragge manages the 500-resident senior home. He says he got just over an hour's notice before the lights went out.
DRAGGE: A lot of things need to happen, and they need to happen quickly.
COHEN: His staff fanned out, delivering blankets and flashlights. Backup generators kept crucial areas like medical facilities going. But some residents, like Ferguson, had an uncomfortable night. Other businesses, like restaurants, reported more than $1 million in lost revenue, and the city's wastewater treatment plant got minutes away from sewage overflowing into a creek. Colorado's governor had the state Public Utilities Commission investigate. Jeff Ackermann, a former member of the commission, said it asked some basic questions.
JEFF ACKERMANN: How are you engaging with city and county emergency management folks? How are you engaging with others where a loss of electricity is not only inconvenient, but highly risky?
COHEN: The commission found Xcel's power shut-off was the right call, but is requiring a checklist of communication improvements. Xcel was not formally reprimanded. Ackermann thinks it'll go better next time. He encourages people to prepare for this new reality.
ACKERMANN: Not to be ready to ride out a wildfire, but ride out the loss of electricity due to wildfire risk. So how do you prepare your home or business for that prospect?
COHEN: Xcel says technology it wants to roll out in a big wildfire plan could help it avoid turning the power off. State regulators are reviewing that $2 billion proposal now, but the major fixes won't be in place until after next wildfire season.
For NPR News, I'm Rachel Cohen.
(SOUNDBITE OF JAKE XERXES FUSSELL'S "THREE RAVENS") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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