PG&E outage slows California ag to a crawl

 Tim Hearden

The forced blackout imposed by Pacific Gas & Electric Co. to reduce fire danger amid high winds has slowed agricultural activities in some parts of California to a crawl as shuttered processing facilities have caused a backup in harvests. Elaine Trevino, president of the Modesto-based Almond Alliance, said Wednesday she knew of five almond hullers that couldn't operate because of the outage, which affected more than 1 million people throughout the state. "All of their machines have stopped," Trevino said of the hullers. "Some have generators, but most don't. "You're talking about equipment, there's the food safety side of things, and then there are the employees and the backup," she said. "There's a lot of variables that are impacted by this operational delay." In Northern California, University of California Cooperative Extension farm advisor Luke Milliron knows of at least one major walnut huller/dryer in the region that had its electricity cut while wet walnuts were in the drying bins, he said. Walnuts degrade in quality if the green wet hull isn't promptly removed after harvest and the nut is dried, he explained in an email. "We are in the midst of walnut harvest and moving forward with harvesting the trees is contingent on the ability to have hulling/drying facilities operational," Milliron said. He added that he suspects that other walnut hullers were shut down, too, and that the economic impact is "uncertain." Along the northern coast, UC Hopland Research and Extension Center director John Bailey reports hearing of wineries that were unable to process grapes and wine...MORE