Process Improvements, State Laws Boost New-Service Connections in October

PG&E’s Service Planning & Design team recently delivered a banner month for new-service connections.

The company completed more than 1,700 new-service connections in October — a company record for a single month.

That’s a 70% increase compared with an average of about 1,000 monthly new-service connections through the first seven months of 2024.

What’s more, the company forecasts that it will complete its 2024 connections work under budget. It expects to spend $83 million, or 6%, less than its $1.4 billion new-business budget for 2024.

“These connections represent new homes, expanding businesses and clean-energy projects,” said PG&E New Business Program Management Office Lead Steven Fischer, who coordinates a team of coworkers mobilized across the company to improve new-service connections. “We’re pleased with the progress we’ve made to help more new-business customers. We look forward to continued improvements through 2024 and beyond.”

The New Business Program Management Office is just one of the improvements PG&E has made following nearly two years of collaboration with the California Building Industry Association, customers and other stakeholders to improve new-service processes.

The Service Planning & Design team also has tested new ideas based on customer feedback and reduced the waiting time between each step in the process.

Those efforts, combined with additional spending approved earlier this year by the California Public Utilities Commission, helped drive October’s connections.

The additional spending traces to a 2023 state law that mandates timelines for connecting new-service customers. To help utilities meet those timelines, a companion law allows the commission to approve additional funding beyond spending allowed in utilities’ General Rate Cases.

The commission voted in July to allow PG&E to invest up to $2.3 billion in additional funding through 2026 to add electric capacity and energize new projects.

That’s on top of $2.6 billion in company revenue already committed to capacity and new-service connections through PG&E’s General Rate Case.

PG&E will spend more than $60 million of that additional funding through the end of 2024.

That revenue funded additional contract electric and civil construction workers and enabled PG&E to hit its connections high mark in October. Contract crews completed roughly 850 jobs in October, up 385% from an average of 175 jobs a month from January to July.

PG&E remains on track to complete 13,000 new-service connections in 2024, above its target of 12,600 connections prior to receiving the additional funding.

PG&E completed 9,800 new-service connections in 2023 and 8,000 in 2022.

The added connections will reduce PG&E’s number of “customers ready and waiting” to nearly zero by the end of 2024. Development representatives said October’s results illustrate that PG&E is committed to serving new customers.

“PG&E has been listening to our industry and making improvements in its new-business process,” said Chris Ochoa, senior counsel for Codes, Regulatory and Legislative Affairs for the California Building Industry Association. “The improvements have been significant. PG&E has shown that when they have additional resources, they can continue to improve their energization timelines.”

The revenue the commission allowed in July was just over half of what PG&E needs to meet the state’s new energization timeline mandates. Based on guidance from the commission, PG&E filed a request in October to ask for the remaining half.

If PG&E spends all commission-authorized funding through PG&E’s General Rate Case and receives and spends all the requested additional funding beyond its General Rate Case, monthly bills for the average customer not enrolled in an income-qualified billing program would increase by:

• $2.64, or 1.2%, in 2025

• $4.24, or 2%, in 2026

• $3.18, or 1.5%, in 2027

PG&E will not charge customers for these costs until after the projects are in service. It’s also important to note that rate decreases in some areas will offset some of these potential increases in coming years

“This funding is essential because it will help PG&E and other utilities meet the state’s housing, economic and climate ambitions,” said Service Planning & Design Senior Director Matt Ventura.

“Beyond providing new homes, business opportunities and a more climate-resilient grid, investment in new-service connections will spread utilities’ operations and maintenance costs among more customers, to the benefit of all.”

Though PG&E is on track to connect 13,000 new customers in 2024, it’s unlikely that November and December will best October for new-service connections. PG&E anticipates fewer connections in the last two months of the year as customers turn their attention to the holidays and submit fewer requests for project completions.

Still, 2024 will end up as a banner year for new-service connections.

“We’re proud of the positive results we’ve achieved just from the relatively small share of additional funding we’re investing in connections in 2024,” Fischer said. “We look forward to helping thousands more customers in 2025 and 2026 with the additional funding we’ve requested.”