by Julia Pyper
May 26, 2017

Michael Picker, president of the California Public Utilities Commission, made an appeal to California customers on Thursday, asking them to help lower electricity use statewide by 3,500 megawatts on August 21, when a full solar eclipse will cause solar PV generation to plummet between 9 a.m. and 12 p.m.

“When the sun goes away, so does the energy that powers our renewable solar panels. If millions of Californians turn off appliances and power strips to unplug from the grid during the eclipse, we can let our hard-working sun take a break,”...