A cyclist riding near 13th Street and South Van Ness yesterday morning collided with a PG&E van and sustained critical injuries that are life-threatening. The van was traveling south on South Van Ness and turned left onto 13th, where the crash occurred. The cyclist was taken to S.F. General, and there is not yet an update on his condition. more ›

Get this: PG&E actually had the balls to ask the state this week if they wouldn't please be so kind as to offset the fine they're expected to be on the hook for for the 2010 San Bruno gas-main explosion. They'd like to get credit for the $221 million they claim to have spent on testing and pipeline changes following the blast — basically all the shit they should have done before they killed eight people and decimated a neighborhood. more ›

We're getting reports of a manhole explosion in the last hour near the corner of Grant and Pine, and PG&E is reportedly already on the scene. Emergency In SF reports that there were two underground explosions. Streets in the vicinity have already been blocked off to vehicle and foot traffic, and we don't yet know if there were any injuries. more ›

Traffic is closed East Bound on Geary Boulevard between 29th & 31st Avenue until after 10:00 a.m. A PG&E vault fire (similar to this one in 2009) caused a widespread power outage. Please fine alternate routes to work or school or wherever today, folks. more ›

Here's your weekly unscheduled PG&E power outage: roughly 2,900 customers are without power along Folsom, Howard and Clementina Streets tonight. City Supervisor Jane Kim, always looking out for her neighborhood, sent out the news via various social media outlets this evening. The outage reportedly struck around 5:35 p.m. and PG&E hopes to have the lights back on by 7:30 tonight. No word yet on the cause, but in the meantime SoMa's plugged-in technology addicts will have to make do on battery power and 3G connections. Godspeed, folks. more ›

A major power outage hit San Francisco today affecting central San Francisco. An estimated 9,000 people are without juice. According to Andrew Dalton at SFist's western headquarters, "a couple of PG&E crews are at Hayes and Baker staring up at power lines and looking dumbfounded." The outage occurred at around 9:40 am. more ›

We wept in to our coffee mugs when PG&E went and robbed us of our daytime programming the other day, and today some 5,100 customers in Noe Valley suffered a similar fate when power to the neighborhood cut out just before 10 a.m. this morning. We reckon the stay-at-home moms in the area made the best of the situation by bundling up the offspring for an extra lap around the neighborhood in the McLaren, but the outage also knocked out power to BART causing some slight delays for the late morning commuters. Basically, it's been a rough day for PG&E crews who have been working to solve service disruptions since early this morning. more ›

A whopping 7,000 PG&E customers are without power this morning after an outage hit the area. Intersections are affected and parking control officers are controlling intersections. Please be advised. Far worse a fate? SFist associate editor Andrew Dalton, who lives/works smack dab on Divisadero at SFist's western offfice, was unable to watch the fourth hour of the Today Show. Godspeed, Andrew and his fellow Western Additionites. more ›

Does anyone really like our local utility company? No, no one does. PG&E blows things up, deprives us of our pastimes and attempts to scramble our brainwaves on a regular basis. So how much longer do we have to put up with this garbage? Well, if we factor in things like the declining cost of solar power and the ever-increasing cost of wattage from the power company, as the folks at Energy Self-Reliant States did, we learn that it will be cheaper to ditch PG&E and go solar as early as five years from now. more ›

In the latest updates from the war on copper theft, four men were busted after swiping copper from a PG&E yard in San Rafael last Friday night. The four men, all of whom have very WASP-y names and are kind of getting up there in years, were busted after a PG&E employee at the yard spotted their suspicious van (of course it was a suspicious van) in a locked and fenced-off parking lot. more ›

In a press conference yesterday afternoon, Mayor Lee called Monday night's power outage at Candlestick Park "a national embarrassment." This is, of course, the same Mayor Lee who once called PG&E "a great company that gets it". Unfortunately, PG&E still doesn't seem to get how their lines could be responsible for the outage that put tens of thousands of football fans in the dark and delayed a nationally televised football game. more ›

Although PG&E admitted last night's power outage at Candlestick Park was due to an exploding transformer, the historically volatile power company doesn't want to take the fall for the incident. As a utility company spokesman told the Chronicle a PG&E power line "lost power for an unknown reason" just before the first outage at 5:19 p.m. last night, but the actual problem occurred when a city-owned transfer switch failed to keep a constant flow of electricity. So, let's recap: more ›

Even if you're not a Marin homeowner yourself, you've likely heard tell about the battles being waged in communities around the Bay Area over PG&E's SmartMeters — electronic power meters which transmit data back to the mothership by wireless signals. The same ilk of folk who get worked up about cell phone towers and the allegedly but disputably harmful affects of minimal microwave radiation get themselves in a lather over SmartMeters being forced upon them as well, and one of those folks, 59-year-old Dianna Glidden of Santa Cruz, blames her SmartMeter for giving her "pressure in her head and buzzing under her skin." more ›

Fifteen months after a high-pressure gas line explosion killed eight people and decimated a neighborhood in San Bruno, PG&E may finally be willing admit they might have done something wrong. It's been three and a half months since the NTSB slapped them up the side of the head and placed all the blame for the accident squarely on PG&E's shoulders, but the utility has been reticent in response to civil lawsuits in San Mateo County court up until now. A judge has now asked PG&E to say whether or not they're going to try to deflect liability in the more than 100 lawsuits now filed against them, and in papers being filed as early as today the company is now stating, "We are acknowledging we are liable for the accident." more ›

According to CBS 5, construction crews have accidentally ruptured a gas line at Mission and Beale streets in downtown San Francisco. Gas is "spewing everywhere." Please stay out of the area until further notice. PG&E and the fire department are on the scene. more ›

Following up on the latest PG&E pipeline rupture that closed part of Interstate 280 near Woodside, the Examiner reports that this one probably wasn't the gas and electric company's fault. more ›

A two-foot section of a PG&E natural gas pipeline in Woodside burst during a safety test yesterday. Luckily for PG&E, whose public image is falling apart faster than its aging pipes these days, the explosion occurred during a hydrostatic pressure test, meaning the pipe was flooded with water rather than something more flammable. No injuries occurred after the pipe ruptured around 3:30 p.m. Sunday afternoon, but the flood of water caused a mudslide that briefly closed down the northbound side of Interstate 280 near Redwood City. more ›

So says PG&E via their twitter feed just before 3 p.m. Friday afternoon. PG&E doesn't yet have an estimate for when the power will be back on, so if you were looking forward to heading home to the neighborhood, microwaving a hot pocket and firing up your TiVo, might we suggest alternate plans for the evening? No word yet on what is causing the outage, but we'll update when we know more. more ›

A gas leak near Viking Avenue and Ruth Drive have prompted the immediate evacuation in the College Park area. Residents are urged not to open their doors or windows. Police said the evacuation is mandatory. Residents are asked to leave by car and call 911 only if they are unable to leave their homes. more ›

Today at around 1:50 pm, there was a manhole cover explosion on Folsom Street at Harriet Street. Alert SF notes: "Folsom Street is closed between 6th and 7th Streets. Harriet Street is closed between Howard and Harrison Streets. Please avoid the area." more ›

AlertSF sent word that a gas main break shut down occurred near Union Square. "At 2:15 today it was reported that a 10" gas main was hit by a construction crew at Mason and Post Streets. All vehicular and pedestrian traffic is being re-routed. PLEASE AVOID THE AREA." more ›

Did you hear that a leaky gas pipe destroyed a home in Cupertino the other day? Just a day after the Feds slapped PG&E up the side of the head with their report on the San Bruno investigation, an explosion and fire ripped through a condo in Cupertino just 15 minutes after the owner had gone out to lunch. No one was injured but the home was totally destroyed. Investigators on the scene found seven leaks in the gas lines going into and around the condo at 20299 Northwest Square. And once again it took PG&E effing forever to shut the gas off after the blast. more ›

The results of the federal probe into the San Bruno gas line explosion of last September were finally presented yesterday, and the NTSB has placed all the blame for the tragedy on PG&E and their general incompetence. Efforts to shift blame by PG&E to things like a nearby sewer line project disrupting the pipe, or to a now-defunct company called Consolidated Western Steel who supplied some pipe, like 50 years ago, to the company, were totally dismissed. NTSB Chairwoman Deborah Hersman said PG&E "exploited weaknesses in a lax system of oversight, and regulatory agencies that placed a blind trust in operators to the detriment of public safety." more ›

Heads up homeward commuters: some of you headed to the Lower Haight might not have power when you get home. According to sources at BCN and the Examiner, the power went out to roughly 5,200 customers including the Castro Muni Station around 2:30 p.m. this afternoon. About 2,900 customers and Muni got their power back within an hour, but PG&E is still reporting an outage in the area as of 5:15 p.m. more ›

"I'm sick and tired of this — being scared all the time," says San Bruno resident Janel Costanzo, after an incident Saturday in which PG&E unsealed an allegedly unused natural gas pipeline and released an extremely strong odor throughout the neighborhood. This all happened at the site of last September's horrific pipeline blast, as workers were performing their ongoing investigations of all the extant pipelines, per a state mandate to do so. more ›

Some Potrero residents became alarmed recently seeing a bunch of PG&E maintenance signs go up near 17th and Missouri, with parking prohibited along a whole side of the street starting last month. After the gas-main explosion in San Bruno last September, any such activity that calls attention to the location of underground gas mains is bound to make people jittery, and Potrero View quickly got someone from PG&E on the horn to figure out what was up. more ›

We're hearing reports of a manhole cover explosion happening in the city's Union Square area. KCBS tweets: "Black smoke reported at Post & Grant in SF, reports of a manhole cover explosion." more ›

With so many folks out there suddenly concerned about the potential dangers of radio frequency radiation, the California Public Utilities Comission asked the power company to propose some radiation-free alternatives to the wireless SmartMeters. Unfortunately for PG&E customers with delicate brainwaves, opting out will be expensive. Various sources reported today that simply having the wireless radio turned off will stick a $135-$270 fee on your power bill, followed by another $14 to $20 per month to cover the cost of sending a meter reader out to your house. more ›

This morning rain - feel it on your fingertips, hear it on the windowpane - has caused minor power outages in the Bay Area. In the North Bay an estimated 1,500 residents are without power, 30 in the East Bay, and 2,300 down in the South Bay. Now outages in San Francisco have been reported. Not yet, anyway. more ›

[RichmondSF reader] Clark, who lives on 2nd Avenue near Clement, says he chose to decline installation today “based on the lack of notice and information about these smart meters.” When he did, the Wellington Energy contractor “just nodded his head” and moved on, Clark reported. Another neighbor on his block also declined installation.