2008 Corporate Responsibility Report
How we are creating a smarter foundation for a sustainable future
Sharpening Our Focus on Safety
At PG&E, we recognize that employee and public safety must be the foundation for everything we do.
We made good progress in key areas in 2008. We significantly reduced on-the-job incident rates, as well as the numbers of lost workdays and motor vehicle incidents. However significant these accomplishments were, though, several tragedies cast a shadow over the year's results, including the deaths of two employees and a contractor while on the job, as well as an injury that cost one employee both of his hands. These events have led us to adopt what we believe are now the most exacting safety policies and practices in PG&E's history.
Geisha Williams, senior vice president of Energy Delivery, addresses employees about the importance of working safely.
In sum, even with last year's strides, we are not satisfied when we compare our performance with that of best-in-class companies. As a result, we continue to sharpen our focus on safety to ensure that we are doing everything we can to prevent injuries and incidents. Going forward, we are holding leaders at all levels accountable to raise the bar on safety and ensure that our human performance is at the level it must be at. To achieve our goal of a work environment with zero incidents, each and every employee must take accountability for working safely.
Our Safety and Health Policy forms the foundation for the programs we use to pursue our goals. In 2006, we began implementing a "Zero In On Safety" initiative, which continues today. It includes tools and information to help employees identify, evaluate and control hazards and safety issues and improve overall safety performance.
Safety Results for 2006 through 2008
2006
2007
2008
Total Lost Workdays1
39,343
35,064
32,304
Total Lost Workday Cases2
177
163
142
Total Lost Workday Case Rate3
0.89
0.79
0.69
Total OSHA Recordables4
1,048
883
699
OSHA Recordable Rate5
5.29
4.30
3.40
1 Total Lost Workdays is an internal PG&E metric that counts the number of workdays lost due to occupational injury or illness.
2 Total Lost Workday Cases is the number of non-fatal occupational injury and illness cases that (1) satisfy OSHA requirements for recordability, (2) occur in the current year and (3) result in at least one day away from work.
3 The Lost Workday Case Rate measures how frequently new Lost Workday Cases occur for every 200,000 hours worked, or for approximately every 100 employees.
4 Total OSHA Recordables is the number of injuries and illnesses that meet OSHA requirements for recordability, i.e., (1) are work-related, (2) are new cases and (3) meet one or more OSHA general recording criteria.
5 The OSHA Recordable Rate measures how frequently occupational injuries and illnesses occur for every 200,000 hours worked, or for approximately every 100 employees.
In 2008, we enhanced the Zero In On Safety program in a number of ways:
- We increased our emphasis on the critical role that employee feedback plays in identifying and resolving potential problems, underscoring our expectation that all employees feel empowered to speak up and proactively address issues. We also established safety committees to build a grassroots network to support safety, health and wellness.
- We continued conducting rigorous, formal root-cause analyses of safety incidents to identify process improvement opportunities and prevent recurrences of incidents. We also continued to rely on incident reporting and data analysis to help systematically eliminate incidents.
- We successfully implemented a new "observation-based" safety program, designed to identify possible safety problems before they occur, during the construction of our new Gateway Generating Station. This new natural gas-fired power plant was built without a lost-time injury in almost 1.8 million hours of work.
- We continued to learn from others in our industry. This included hosting a benchmarking forum with seven leading utilities to share principles, processes and best practices.
We also set aggressive targets for safety in 2008, with the intent of accelerating our march toward zero incidents. Compared with our targets of a 15 percent reduction from a 2007 baseline, we reduced our OSHA Recordable Rate by nearly 21 percent and our Lost Workday Case Rate by more than 13 percent. We also continued to reduce the total number of Lost Workdays, with nearly 8 percent fewer Lost Workdays than in 2007. The table above provides complete safety statistics for 2006 through 2008.
Working Safely with Flame-Retardant Clothing
After nearly four years of planning and preparation, PG&E took proactive steps last year to further protect employees from the dangers of arc flashes, adopting new measures in advance of regulatory requirements.
Arc flashes—sudden releases of electrical energy through the air—give off extreme heat and light that can cause serious burns. They can occur while employees are working on or close to any energized source of electricity.
PG&E began introducing a new procedure and training program last year, designed to educate employees on the dangers of arc flash hazards. After receiving the training, field crews were fitted for flame-resistant clothing. Unlike natural-fiber clothing, flame-resistant clothing prevents heat transfer to the skin.
Under the new procedure, employees with regular exposure to energized electrical equipment are required to wear PG&E-approved flame-resistant clothing to work every day. Employees who have infrequent exposure to energized electrical equipment are required to wear flame-resistant clothing at times when they might come in contact with arc flash hazards.
Continued Focus on Motor Vehicle Safety
The safe operation of our large fleet of vehicles is essential to achieving our employee and public safety goals. PG&E continued its motor vehicle safety program in 2008, with an increased emphasis on driver training. Through 2008, 8,000 employees successfully completed a formal, one-day driver training program, which involves two hours of classroom instruction and six hours of behind-the-wheel training. Other priorities include improved tracking and reporting and ensuring company vehicles carry a 1-800 "Am I Driving Safely?" decal.
These combined motor vehicle safety programs resulted in a nearly 24 percent net reduction in the vehicle incident rate last year, based on more than 128 million PG&E driving miles.
Motor Vehicle Safety Statistics (Utility)
2006
2007
2008
Total Motor Vehicle Incidents1
733
536
439
Motor Vehicle Incident Rate2
6.54
4.48
3.42
1 Total Motor Vehicle Incidents is an internal PG&E metric counting motor vehicle incidents that could not have been reasonably prevented by an employee.
2 The Motor Vehicle Incident Rate measures how frequently motor vehicle incidents occur for every 1,000,000 miles driven.
Powering Up for Wellness
Nationwide, health care costs continue to rise at a rapid rate. This growing challenge, coupled with national and employee health trends, as well strong employee interest, has led PG&E to refocus on employee health.
In 2008, PG&E launched Live Bright, a campaign to promote employee health inside and outside the workplace. The campaign includes information, resources and tools to help employees start thinking about their health and health care in a whole new way. By encouraging healthier behaviors, we aim to create a safer, more reliable and more productive workforce.
In 2009, we introduced a "wellness account" for non-union-represented employees that is fully funded by PG&E. Employees who complete certain activities or engage in healthy behaviors earn credits deposited into the account, which can then be used to pay for eligible health care expenses. Employees can also earn credit by taking an online health risk questionnaire, which points out opportunities to improve their health.
For the future, we're also exploring new plan options that can help employees take more control of health care expenses and save money on a pre-tax basis for both current and long-term health needs.
Independent research has shown that 70 to 75 percent of the nation’s employee health care costs are related to lifestyle or modifiable behavior. PG&E is focused on enhancing wellness programs and resources that encourage and support employees to make healthier choices. For example, last year, we invited employees who wished to quit smoking to sign up for a comprehensive coaching program. More than 180 employees and spouses have enrolled so far, most of whom have tried to quit numerous times using a variety of methods. “Smokeless” is but one of a number of wellness initiatives PG&E is offering employees in the areas of fitness, weight loss, nutrition, stress management and self-care.
Life-Safety Program
Planning and preparation for emergencies is a critical part of PG&E's basic business. Our focus in this area extends to a number of efforts to ensure our employees are trained and equipped to respond to life-safety emergencies.
For example, PG&E continues to enhance its life-safety program, which includes Floor Wardens and Emergency Team members led by a life-safety director at numerous buildings. These employee volunteers are trained on a variety of topics, including first aid, automatic external defibrillators, CPR, blood-borne pathogens and proper use of fire extinguishers. The courses allow team members to maintain a two-year certification for first aid and CPR, and team-based exercises enable employees to work through various emergency situations together. In 2008, more than 400 employees participated in these courses.
Public Safety Education
Creating a safe environment for our customers and communities is as important to us as the safety of our employees. PG&E's comprehensive Public Safety Information Program focuses on increasing awareness about the safe and proper use of gas and electricity, as well as helping to keep those working around utility lines safe from harm. This program distributes user-friendly, engaging educational materials to our customers in multiple languages. For our efforts, regulators and our peer utilities continue to cite our public safety information program as best-in-class.
As part of a proactive effort, PG&E instructors educated first responders with the U.S. Forest Service last year on gas and electric safety issues.
Some examples of our programs and 2008 activities include:
- SafeKids School Safety Program. Over the past nine years, PG&E has provided free safety education materials to teachers in more than 85 percent of the schools in our service area. In 2008, we enhanced our SafeKids website by adding interactive games and experiments, and a new coloring book on outdoor electrical safety. Teachers regularly comment that the materials are fun and effective in helping students learn the importance of gas and electric safety.
- Contractor and Agricultural Worker Outreach. PG&E continues to provide safety training materials to contractors and agricultural workers throughout our service area. These materials include bilingual brochures, posters and videos. Over the past seven years, more than 175,000 construction employees and 85,000 agricultural workers have received these materials through their employers. In addition, PG&E continues to work with trade associations and safety groups statewide to help distribute safety information directly to their members.
- Emergency Preparedness. PG&E works closely with organizations like the Red Cross, local city emergency preparedness councils and community emergency response teams to provide brochures and other materials that help explain how to prepare for an earthquake, how and when to shut off utilities and why it is necessary to have an emergency kit.