Judge demolishes leftist theory that climate change is to blame for deadly California wildfires
As massive wildfires ravaged dense areas of California last autumn, progressives and liberals alike placed blame for the tragedy on climate change.
National Geographic said: "Climate change is making California's fires bigger."
The Los Angeles Times declared: "Bigger wildfires. Worsening droughts. More disease. How Climate change is battering California."
The Washington Post dedicated an entire story to debunking claims made by President Donald Trump in which he blamed "forest mismanagement" for the deadly fires. That's false, the Post declared, identifying climate change as the fire antagonist.
But a California judge vehemently disagrees — and on Friday, he issued a ruling explaining why climate change is not to blame.
What did the judge say?
U.S. District Court Judge William Alsup ruled last Thursday that California utility company Pacific Gas and Electric was "the single most recurring cause" that contributed to devastating wildfires that
burned millions of acres and led to the deaths of dozens of California residents.
According to NBC News, Alsup wrote in a scathing opinion:
The Court tentatively finds that the single most recurring cause of the large 2017 and 2018 wildfires attributable to PG&E's equipment has been the susceptibility of PG&E's distribution lines to trees or limbs falling onto them during high-wind events.
The power conductors are almost always uninsulated. When the conductors are pushed together by falling trees or limbs, electrical sparks drop into the vegetation below. During the wildfire season when the vegetation is dry, these electrical sparks pose an extreme danger of igniting a wildfire.
Scott McLean, deputy chief of communication for the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, told NBC the state determined PG&E was liable for 12 of 17 wildfires during the 2017 season, but has yet to rule on...
The key comment about the fire cause is "the susceptibility of PG&E's distribution lines to trees or limbs falling onto them during high-wind events."
ReplyDeletePG&E was not allowed to clear dangerous trees, trim limbs, clean brush from power lines, nor were they allowed to work on any other mitigation. Insulated lines don't work well when rubbed repeatedly, and still need vegetation management to control trees.
So... Yes, PG&E is somewhat at fault, but the main blame is on the citizens and denizens of the area that didn't want the power company to trim the trees.
Back in 1998, half of Florida burned because the idiots in the Tampa-Orlando-Daytona corridor didn't want prescribed burns of the forests. So instead they got a statewide firestorm that instead of burning a little, seared whole swaths of land. The scars are still there, over 20 years later.
Oh, coincidentally, the same idjits that believe in man-made global climate change also are the idiots that fight tooth-and-nail to stop prescribed burns, cutting and maintaining fire barriers,trimming of transmission and power lines AND large water storage systems like lakes and dams. Butt-heads.
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