The closures ultimately occurred in areas that included all five polling places, Smith said. The utility’s plan called for customers to be notified several times in advance of potential shutoffs, and media reports warned residents of the possible shutoffs and how they were not expected to impact the vote. Backup generation was turned on when needed so voting could continue uninterrupted, Smith said.

Fact check: Video shows conversation with county official, not ‘illegal’ voters ‘cutting’

California regulators ruled in 2012 that investor-owned utilities had the right to shut off the electrical power flowing through their wires “to protect public safety,” a tool that has become increasingly important as their size and cost of forest fires have increased over the past decade. . The move is considered a last resort to “prevent catastrophic wildfires when high winds, heat and related conditions are present” and could, for example, plunge live transmission lines into dry vegetation, according to the California Public Utilities Commission.

The commission also said that utility infrastructure has been identified as a cause of less than 10% of wildfires, but electrical infrastructure represents about half of the most destructive wildfires ever recorded in the state. PG&E’s infrastructure has been linked to some high-profile fires, though it did not admit any wrongdoing in a 2022 settlement of charges stemming from a pair of wildfires in Northern California.