{"id":15434,"date":"2023-02-24T10:15:02","date_gmt":"2023-02-24T17:15:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/peninsula360press.com\/?p=15434"},"modified":"2023-02-24T10:15:04","modified_gmt":"2023-02-24T17:15:04","slug":"san-mateo-county-power-grid","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/peninsula360press.com\/en\/san-mateo-county-power-grid\/","title":{"rendered":"Strong winds and falling trees continue to affect San Mateo County power grid"},"content":{"rendered":"
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By Eli Walsh. Bay City News<\/a>.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The deputy mayor of East Palo Alto called on Pacific Gas and Electric on Thursday to upgrade its infrastructure as some residents on the peninsula have been without power for two days due to high winds and downed power lines.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

More than 60,000 PG&E customers in San Mateo County have been affected by power outages caused by high winds earlier this week, making San Mateo the hardest-hit county in the Bay Area.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Some homes in the city have been without power since 1 p.m. Tuesday, according to East Palo Alto Vice Mayor Antonio Lopez.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

PG&E has expressed optimism that power could be restored by 10 p.m. Thursday, according to state Sen. Josh Becker, D-San Mateo, but some are still in the dark for now.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lopez and Becker also chided the utility for failing to adequately communicate about the ongoing outages.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cMany of our residents have called the city to ask, \u2018When will the power come back on? \u2019\u201d Lopez said in a virtual news conference Thursday afternoon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThey go to the PG&E website and depending on where you live, it could be anywhere from 3 p.m. today, 11 p.m. tonight, 11 p.m. the next day,\u201d he said. \u201cSo for us on the ground, it\u2019s hard to find a rhyme or reason as to when and how the power will come back on.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lopez and Becker noted that many residents without power have medical conditions or equipment that requires electricity or do not have hot water.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The county is also expected to see overnight low temperatures in the mid-30s. Given that, the two officials said it's imperative that residents get their power back as soon as possible.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Becker added that the county faced flooding and power issues less than two months ago during storms that battered the Bay Area for much of January.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI know there are teams that are working really hard, and I\u2019m not here to criticize the people who are working 24\/7 to try to fix this\u2026 but sometimes it feels like our infrastructure is more 1923 than 2023 and it just doesn\u2019t feel acceptable that we have to go through this,\u201d he stressed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Power outages elsewhere in San Mateo County halted traffic in Menlo Park for most of Thursday afternoon as PG&E crews worked to replace a power line along U.S. Highway 101 that was damaged by a fallen tree.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The highway was closed in both directions after 1 p.m. and reopened around 5 p.m., according to the utility.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

PG&E has brought 20 additional crews to the peninsula in an effort to repair downed power lines, clear fallen trees and speed power restoration throughout San Mateo County.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to Menlo Park officials, the city received 27 calls about downed trees and 46 calls about broken tree limbs between 1 p.m. Tuesday and 4 p.m. Wednesday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to PG&E, repairs and replacement of existing power lines are further complicated by snow in low-lying areas of the Bay Area that is snapping trees that don't typically receive snow.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhen that happens, the tree can fall on a power line and knock it down and also damage the poles,\u201d said Jan Nimick, vice president of power generation for PG&E. \u201cVery often, repairs are complex because there is a lot of severe damage to our equipment, and repairs can also be complicated by access issues.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bay Area residents are encouraged to visit pge.com\/stormsafety for tips on how to prepare for cold and stormy weather events.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Those in Menlo Park who remain without power can contact the city manager's office at (650) 330-6610 before 8 p.m. Thursday to request an overnight hotel stay.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Residents can also request hotel stay information in person at the Belle Haven Library Branch before 8 p.m.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Requests for overnight hotel stays can be made to swstotle@menlopark.gov by 8 p.m. Thursday. Residents should include \u201cRequest for Hotel Stay During Power Outage\u201d in the subject line of the email.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

PG&E's outage map can be found at https:\/\/pgealerts.alerts.pge.com\/outagecenter<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You can find San Mateo County information about this week's storms, cold weather, and wind events at https:\/\/www.smcgov.org\/ceo\/county-storm-related-emergency-information<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You may be interested in: Cold Front will continue to hit the Bay Area<\/a><\/em><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Por Eli Walsh. Bay City News. El vicealcalde de East Palo Alto pidi\u00f3 a Pacific Gas and Electric este jueves que modernice su infraestructura ya que algunos residentes de la pen\u00ednsula han estado sin electricidad durante dos d\u00edas debido a los fuertes vientos y las l\u00edneas el\u00e9ctricas ca\u00eddas. M\u00e1s de 60 mil clientes de PG&E […]<\/p>","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":15436,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,14],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-15434","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-community","8":"category-cover"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/peninsula360press.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15434","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/peninsula360press.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/peninsula360press.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peninsula360press.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peninsula360press.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15434"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/peninsula360press.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15434\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15437,"href":"https:\/\/peninsula360press.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15434\/revisions\/15437"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peninsula360press.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15436"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/peninsula360press.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15434"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peninsula360press.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15434"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peninsula360press.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15434"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}