The California Public Utilities Commission approved on Thursday a $45 million dollar settlement with the utility Pacific Gas and Electric for its role in the 2021 Dixie Fire.
Investigators found the blaze was started after a tree fell on power lines owned by PG&E.
The fire burned over 900,000 acres across five counties, including Shasta and Tehama, and took months to extinguish. It was the second largest wildfire in California history.
As part of the settlement, PG&E will spend $40 million on transitioning from hard copy to electronic records in order to make infrastructure inspections easier and faster.
The company will also pay $2.5 million to the California General Fund and $2.5 million to tribes impacted by the fire.
Allen Lowry, a member of the Maidu Tribe in northeastern California and a board member of the Maidu Summit Consortium, said his community is still cleaning up debris from the Dixie Fire.
“I know it's going to take generations of healing for that land to come back,” said Lowry.
For him, the $2.5 million settlement for tribes is a “slap in the face” compared to the damage it caused.
California regulators have fined PG&E before. In 2021, the utility paid $125 million for its role in Sonoma County’s Kincade Fire. Last year, it paid $50 million for the 2020 Zogg Fire.
PG&E also agreed to establish a $13.5 billion trust for fire victims after pleading guilty to charges from 2018’s Camp Fire. The wildfire killed 85 and was California’s deadliest.
The company plans to bury over a thousand miles of powerlines in high-risk areas to prevent future wildfires.
