Shareholder Lawsuit Fired at Edison International

The Eaton Canyon Fire began on January 7, 2025, in the Altadena area of Los Angeles County. After eyewitness accounts, photographs that showed the fire was started by Edison’s electrical equipment and subsequent investigations suggested that the fire originated near Edison’s electrical towers, a complaint was filed on January 13th claiming that the fires originated from Edison’s power lines.

The Shareholder Lawsuit

This shareholder complaint was brought by Charlotte Bark, a shareholder of Edison International, the parent company of Southern California Edison (SCE), and filed in May in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles. According to court documents, Edison International officers and directors misled the company’s investors about the effectiveness of its efforts to reduce the risk of wildfire in the months and years before the devastating Eaton fire; and that the company repeatedly said in its federal regulatory reports that it had reduced the risk of a catastrophic wildfire by more than 85% since 2018 by increasing equipment inspections, tree trimming and other work aimed at stopping fires.

Doubts have also been raised regarding news releases and other statements made by Edison soon after the Eaton fire started, which killed 18 people and destroyed thousands of homes and businesses in Altadena. For instance, the company said that SCE used its Public Safety Power Shutoffs (PSPS) program to proactively de-energize power lines during extreme weather events to reduce wildfire risk. According to the complaint, however, SCE failed to properly implement these safety measures, resulting in increased wildfire risk and legal exposure. Claimdepot.com reported that, despite Edison initially stating that its lines had been de-energized, further disclosures revealed that there were no interruptions or anomalies in the lines prior to the start of the fire. The lawsuit claiming Edison’s power lines caused the fire followed.

Edison Responds

According to the Los Angeles Times, an Edison spokesman said the company “will review this lawsuit and respond through the appropriate legal channels.” And Pedro Pizarro, the chief executive of Edison International, said a leading theory for the fire’s start was the reenergization of an unused, decades-old transmission line in Eaton Canyon. Like closing the barn door after the horse has bolted Edison told the LA Times that it “will take steps to harden other idle towers and lines across its network to prevent reenergizing incidents. Those measures include conducting additional field inspections, reviewing past inspections, and making changes in an internal maintenance manual that instruct crews on how to properly ground the idle equipment.”

The Public Utilities Code states that “Every public utility shall furnish and maintain such adequate, efficient, just, and reasonable service, instrumentalities, equipment, and facilities … as are necessary to promote the safety, health, comfort, and convenience of its patrons, employees, and the public.” To meet this safety mandate, utilities are required to:

• Comply with California Public Utilities Commission (“CPUC”) General Order 95’s rules for overhead electric line construction.
• In extreme fire areas, utilities are required to ensure their power lines and utility poles can withstand winds of up to ninety-two miles per hour. 
• Lines temporarily out of service shall be inspected and maintained in such condition as not to create a hazard.
• Maintain around and adjacent to any pole or tower which supports a switch, fuse, transformer, lightning arrester, line junction, or dead end or corner pole, a firebreak, which consists of a clearing of not less than 10 feet in each direction from the outer circumference of such pole or tower.

The shareholder lawsuit also points out that electrical equipment has historically posed a great wildfire risk to California. Since 1992, over 3,600 wildfires in the Golden State have been tied to powerlines and electrical equipment. Electrical equipment has been the cause of 479 wildfires in California in 2023 alone. Edison’s equipment was previously blamed for wildfires in 2017 and 2018, resulting in estimated losses of $9.9 billion.

Edison International is primarily focused on generating and distributing electric power. Headquartered in Rosemead, California, it operates through its subsidiaries, including SCE, which is one of the largest electric utilities in the U.S., serving approximately 50,000 square miles in Southern California, and providing electricity to millions of customers.