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             California Public Utilities Commission
505 Van Ness Avenue, Room 5301            San Francisco, CA 94102
CONTACT: Armando Rendon           September 20, 1996     CPUC-076
         415-703-1366                                (I94-06-012)

    CPUC PROPOSES TREE TRIMMING RULES FOR ELECTRIC UTILITIES

     The California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) today,
striving to curtail the tree-related outages and fires that have
recently plagued California, proposed rules that would require
the state's electric utilities to speed up the trimming or
removal of trees near power lines.
     Finding the existing tree trimming rules in need of
modification, the Commission proposed to adopt the clearances
presented in a settlement between the CPUC's Safety Branch staff
and the electric distribution utilities.  Although the
settlement was opposed, the Commission proposed to adopt the
clearances because of the urgency to assure public safety and the
reliability of the electricity distribution system.
     The Commission proposed the settlement rules today with the
intent of issuing the interim rules before December.  Its order
also launches a further inquiry into the development of permanent
rules which it would adopt next year.
     Specific standards for separation between live power lines
and trees or shrubs were proposed: Rule 37 of General Order 95
adds a minimum separation of six inches between line conductors
and vegetation under normal conditions for circuits carrying
between 750 to 35,000 volts.  Distance from vegetation at the
time of trimming would depend on the voltage of a given line:
2,400 to 72,000 volts, 4 feet of clearance; up to 110,000 volts,
6 feet; up to 300,000 volts, 10 feet, and, for 300,000 or more
volts, a new standard set in the settlement, 15 feet.
     The Commission emphasized that it was concerned about
adopting a clearance standard of six inches, even on an interim
basis, but the standard was only a minimum and not the distance
                             -more-
to which foliage must be pruned.  It proposes to develop a more
complete record to justify permanent clearances, and seeks
comment on whether the minimum clearances in the Public
Resources Code are reasonable--the Code provides for minimum
clearances of at least 4 feet in rural and forested areas.
     The utilities affected, Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E),
Southern California Edison (SCE), San Diego Gas & Electric
(SDG&E), Pacific Power and Light, and Sierra Pacific Power
Company, are to reach full compliance with Rule 37 changes in 25
percent increments each six months through September 1998.  The
CPUC's Energy Division will monitor progress and is directed to
take prompt enforcement action against utilities which fail to
meet the Commission's timetable.
     The CPUC's review of safety aspects of tree trimming
practices was initially prompted by the accidental electrocution
in 1992 of a farmworker trimming trees near SDG&E power lines.
Because the incident raised general concerns about tree trimming
practices, the CPUC split off a separate proceeding in June 1994
just to deal with tree trimming issues.
     Two major outages this summer originated outside the state
due to trees coming in contact with power lines, but numerous
outages and related fires, one a devastating blaze in Sonoma
County recently, have also occurred in California because of
trees growing too close to power lines.
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