The San Francisco Chronicle has aggressively covered the fallout from the September 2010 natural gas explosion that devastated San Bruno, California, killing eight people and destroying 38 homes, and in this morning’s paper, Chronicle reporter Jaxon Van Derbeken has done it again.

In an exclusive story, Van Derbeken reports on internal PG&E documents he obtained that detail how PG&E encouraged its managers to downgrade the status of nearly 2,300 natural gas leaks the company had identified throughout its natural gas pipeline network and defer the maintenance in order to save the company as much as $5 million.

According to Van Derbeken’s story, PG&E even put in place a system that rewarded managers for staying within their maintenance budgets by deferring leak repairs.

Read the entire story at: http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/PG-E-memo-Downgrading-leaks-would-cut-costs-3709090.php