Pg&E_Microenvironment

One of the most importing forces in PG&E’s current Microenvironment is the Public environment. PG&E has been dominating the local media in the past few months because of a gas line explosion, which has caused a lot of negative publicity. The public opinion of PG&E can affect the company in many ways. One is in public elections that can affect the monopoly that PG&E holds. One example of this is Prop 16, which will be voted on this November and gives local government the ability to spend on alternate energy that would replace the need for PG&E. An important force in PG&E’s current Macroenvironment is the Natural Environment. The supply of raw materials effects PG&E plants and supply of gas and electricity, which affect prices for PG&E customers. Furthermore, environmental safety and scarcity of materials can encourage government and organizations to seek alternative sources of energy that would replace PG&E. Even though PG&E has been put in a difficult position as a result of this gas pipeline explosion, they have done good job of handling the crisis. Their website has a lot of content in regards to the work they have done to fix the problem, including a $100 million fund to the recovery efforts. Also, they have shown that they are taking the steps the help avoid this crisis in the future by announcing the “Pipeline 2020” efforts, which will help create safer pipeline standards by the year 2020. My recommendation to PG&E in dealing with this crisis is to start a campaign to show that PG&E is run and operated by typical people throughout the region. This will help so that people don’t just see PG&E as a corporation, but a company ran by hard working people that we can all relate too. Perhaps have an ad of an employee who lost a home in San Bruno. And also show how hard employees are working around the clock to help fix the problem in San Bruno and to insure that this problem doesn’t occur again.