![]() ![]() Hannun ’s story, as told to Protocol, has been edited for clarity and brevity. Here’s how Hannun decided to make the leap. ![]() The fact that Dandelion made it work despite these headwinds illustrates that everyday innovation is just as crucial to combating climate change as moon shots are. When Hannun was weighing her options in 2016, it was long before the heat pumps that Dandelion sells to homeowners had made any dent in the HVAC market, and the climate tech market was tepid at best. But it wasn’t initially clear that it would be the success it has become. So Hannun left behind the Big Tech support that X provided and spun Dandelion Energy off in 2017.įive years later, Hannun says, the company is growing as fast as can be. However, the idea didn’t quite fit the definition of moon shot, given that geothermal technology already existed and was widely used in countries like Sweden. That’s where Kathy Hannun was working when she came across a relatively untapped opportunity in the U.S.: drilling into the Earth’s crust to access thermal energy for home use. The residents of California might want to pay closer attention.The tech industry has a love for moon shot ideas that are unproven but could be transformative if they work.Īlphabet’s X innovation lab is home to some of the industry’s biggest moon shots. If past is prologue, it’s important to ask whether they’re up to the task. While fixing today’s problems, PG&E and others will have to fix tomorrow’s - most foreseeably the challenge of keeping rates low enough to avoid a public backlash. ![]() This is true of the energy grid we have today, but especially urgent as the clean-energy transition accelerates (as often mandated by the government, which last week announced a full phaseout of gas-burning cars by 2035). The biggest utilities in California will have to figure a way to earn a return for shareholders without compromising safety and reliability. One big lesson learned: Because modern life is utterly dependent on massive inputs of electricity and other forms of energy, a laissez-faire market in large-scale power generation won’t work. “In doing so, they failed to recognize that a changing climate had made PG&E’s power lines an immediate threat to the state.” The state’s policymakers “treated the company as a tool in their quest to preempt the long-term effects of climate change with ambitious renewable energy mandates,” Blunt writes. The next two months will bring anxiety, but also a handful of books on the crisis of fire, ranging from history to journalism to children’s lit. Basic safety is not.īooks As another brutal fire season rages, 4 new books bring context and consolation The author makes a good case as to why: Green energy is glamorous. Lawmakers and regulators, laser-focused on an aggressive transformation to cleaner energy, gave climate-change mitigation - in this case, wildfire prevention - short shrift. Blunt paints a picture - while in no way downplaying the need to address climate change - of long-term thinking that was ironically, tragically, short-sighted. The mishandling of the climate crisis was only one of its disastrous effects, albeit a crucial one. California likes to paint itself as an innovative leader, but its late-’90s move toward electricity market deregulation was a disaster. The safety problem, Blunt makes clear, is systemic. PG&E, the giant utility that covers most of Northern California, takes center stage, but the supporting cast includes members of the state Legislature and the California Public Utilities Commission, which deserve more scrutiny than they’ve received for the roles they’ve played in PG&E’s conflagrations. Any detail necessary to understand the electric grid and how it works is woven seamlessly and clearly through the narrative. Its efforts include a massive expansion of tree-trimming to protect power lines, plans to bury hundreds of miles of transmission and distribution lines underground and quick power shutoffs on the most dangerous hot and windy days.īlunt’s book is not a technical tome but a drama, a human tragedy, loaded with fascinating characters and tales of death and destruction, incompetence and chicanery, malfeasance and greed. After decades of gross negligence, multiple wildfires, a neighborhood gas pipeline explosion, scores of guilty pleas to involuntary manslaughter and billions in property damage, the company appears at last to be taking safety seriously. How about you try not to burn my house down?” “We are delivering for our hometowns, serving our planet and leading with love,” I recited. When I read Pacific Gas and Electric’s mission statement aloud to my wife, her eyes narrowed. If you buy books linked on our site, The Times may earn a commission from, whose fees support independent bookstores. California Burning: The Fall of Pacific Gas and Electric - and What It Means for America's Power Grid ![]()
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