California power provider PG&E Corp. yesterday unveiled the outlines of a reorganization plan that will pay $17.9 billion for claims stemming from the wildfires that pushed it to seek bankruptcy protection, Reuters reported. The plan filed in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in San Francisco includes payments capped at $8.4 billion for wildfire victims, payments capped at $8.5 billion for reimbursing insurers that had paid victims and a $1 billion settlement with local governments. The plan also would pay PG&E’s debts in full and honor the company’s contracts, including ones for buying renewable energy to help California meet its goals for cutting greenhouse emissions. “Under the plan we filed today, we will meet our commitment to fairly compensate wildfire victims and we will emerge from chapter 11 financially sound and able to continue meeting California’s clean energy goals,” PG&E Chief Executive and President Bill Johnson said in a statement. San Francisco-based PG&E sought chapter 11 protection in January. At the time, the company expected more than $30 billion in liabilities from wildfires in California in 2017 and 2018, including November’s Camp Fire, the deadliest and most destructive wildfire of the state’s modern history. PG&E must file a detailed reorganization plan by Sept. 29, the day its exclusivity period for filing a chapter 11 plan expires. If PG&E resolves its bankruptcy by the end of June 2020, it will be able to participate in a recently enacted, $21 billion state fund to help California’s investor-owned utilities pay for future wildfires liabilities.
