How PG&E bankruptcy ranks among other utility bankruptcies

Sen. John Hoeven (R-N.D.) discusses how PG&E filed for bankruptcy following the California wildfires and how California lawmakers traveled to Hawaii with utility executives last year, while the wildfires destroyed parts of The Golden State.

The owner of California’s largest power company, PG&E, filed for bankruptcy protection amid billions of dollars in liabilities stemming from a November 2018 wildfire -- the most deadly in California history -- as well as a slew of fires in 2017.

The filing by Pacific Gas and Electric is officially the biggest bankruptcy of utility giants since 1991 and the sixth biggest of all time behind the 2009 bankruptcy of CIT Group, a commercial lender.

It is also the second time the California-based power company has filed for bankruptcy. In 2001, it filed for Chapter 11 protection from creditors due to unreimbursed power costs that ran at more than $300 million a month.

Here’s a list of the seven biggest utility giants to file for bankruptcy, according to New Generation Research’s Bankruptcydata.com.

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1. Pacific Gas and Electric Co.

Filing Date: 01/29/2019

Actual Assets: $67.8 billion

2. Energy Future Holdings Corp.

Filing Date: 04/29/2014

Actual Assets: $40.9 billion

3. Pacific Gas and Electric Co.

Filing Date: 04/06/2001

Actual Assets: $36.1 billion

4. Calpine Corp.

Filing Date: 12/20/2005

Actual Assets: $27.2 billion

5. Mirant Corp.

Filing Date: 07/14/2003

Actual Assets: $19.4 billion

6. NRG Energy Inc.

Filing Date: 05/14/2003

Actual Assets: $10.8 billion

7. Dynegy Inc.

Filing Date: 11/07/2011

Actual Assets: $9.9 billion