Southern California Edison agreed to pay the United States $80 million to resolve claims and recovery costs associated with suppressing and recovering from the 2017 Thomas Fire—ending a nearly four-year litigation process.
“Obviously, we are not happy about the fire and the cause of the fire, but we are happy to reach a settlement with SCE [Southern California Edison] and use the funds to restore the natural resources and infrastructure that was destroyed by the fire,” said Christopher Stubbs, the Los Padres National Forest forest supervisor. “We are still having downstream effects from the fire. The floods we had last winter and this winter and lasting damage is in part due to the Thomas Fire.”
The Thomas Fire began in 2017 as two separate fires that later joined to burn more than 280,000 acres total—including 150,000 acres of national forest lands in Ventura and Santa Barbara counties. In 2020, the United States filed a lawsuit on behalf of the Forest Service against SCE to recover costs incurred while fighting the fire and to fund continued restorative efforts.
“Forest Service investigators determined that the Thomas Fire ignited when power lines (conductors) SCE owned, maintained, and operated made contact with each other during a high wind event, causing heated material to ignite dry vegetation below the conductors,” according to the complaint filed by the United States. “SCE violated its general, statutory, and regulatory duties by failing to properly construct and maintain its equipment and power lines … which may cause a fire and failure to take reasonable precautions to avoid starting and spreading a fire.”
This is the largest wildfire cost recovery settlement made by the U.S. Attorney’s Office in the Central District of California—which includes Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino, San Luis Obispo, Santa Barbara, and Ventura counties, according to the U.S Attorney’s Office. Of the $80 million, about $37.7 million will be allocated to the Los Padres National Forest for recovery and restoration efforts—dollars expected in the next few months, Stubbs said.
“We’ll endeavor to use the funds as expeditiously as we can, but we also want to do it in a measured and thoughtful way. It does have to be directly related to the Thomas Fire or the downstream effects, and that will be the focus of our efforts,” he said.
The Forest Service prepared a resource damage assessment for the lawsuit, which included some specifics as to how the $37.7 million will be allocated, but the Forest Service is still determining how it will implement those dollars.
Jill Casselman, an assistant United States attorney, told the Sun that she didn’t have the specifics on how the remainder of the $80 million will be spent, but some categories include emergency rehabilitation costs, firefighting cost recovery, reforestation, relocating endangered frogs and toads, and hazardous tree removal.
“The Thomas Fire was a catastrophic fire; it was so resource-intensive to put out and did so much damage to the Los Padres National Forest and … to private land,” Casselman said. “I think Edison has paid a lot of money to resolve this suit and other suits, and I hope their decision-making in the future will be affected by the fact these lawsuits can and will happen.”
In 2020, SCE paid Santa Barbara County $28.1 million for Thomas Fire damages after a nearly two-year litigation process, according to previous Sun reporting. As part of the federal settlement, SCE paid without admitting fault, which is common when reaching financial agreements, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office.
SCE Spokesperson David Eisenhauer told the Sun that SCE has covered 5,700 miles of power lines with non-conductive materials to reduce wildfire risk, completed 360-degree inspections of equipment, and did a “robust” vegetation management program to inspect 1.6 million trees in its service area—which it cuts back if they are too close to power lines.
“The settlement with the Department of Justice resolving the Thomas Fire litigation is a reasonable resolution,” Eisenhauer said. “We continue to protect our communities from the risk of wildfire with grid hardening, situational awareness, and enhanced operational practices.”
