Hola. Stories you shouldn’t miss:
1) Seven months after the deadly San Bruno blast, PG&E Corp. CEO Peter Darbee is leaving the embattled company — but not without a golden parachute. In an e-mail to his staff, Darbee — who’s been urged to step down by consumer advocates and pundits in the wake of the disaster (not to mention the SmartMeters controversy) — acknowledged the difficulties PG&E has faced recently and framed his resignation as an opportunity for a fresh start. But he’s not going gently into that good night: Darbee is expected to collect a cool $34.6 million when he officially leaves at the end of the month. (Various watchdog groups have already vowed to make sure shareholders, not taxpayers, foot the bill for the retirement package.)
2) And meanwhile, in further PG&E news, the company admitted yesterday that it can’t comply with an order to come up with satisfactory records for all of its pipelines. After news broke that the faulty weld responsible for the San Bruno blast hadn’t been inspected, the state ordered the company to turn over records on some 1,800 miles of pipe. But in documents filed yesterday with the Public Utilities Commission, the company more or less gave up the ghost on finding all such records, telling the Commission that it could either accept educated guesses about some of its pipe work, or it could force the company to spend the next five years shutting down pipelines and re-inspecting them.
