I agree that power outages kill, in a statistical sense: some will die without A/C, some will eat bad food, etc. I disagree that humans have no responsibility over their own safety and health. Almost all services are provided on a best-efforts basis. Police aren’t liable if a known criminal attacks you. FDA isn’t liable for denying you a life-saving drug. Insurance companies aren’t (despite appearances) money machines—any additional benefit comes with increased premiums, and they’re pretty much never liable for your suffering.
You can argue that (some of) the current California outages are negligent or are negligently handled (not enough notice or assistance to those whose health is impacted). Courts can sort that out, slowly and usually in favor of the more expensive legal team.
In the meantime, if you need power, you need to have enough backup to be able to survive an outage, and to travel somewhere safer if it lasts too long. Whether insurance covers it is a separate issue, unrelated to your ultimate responsibility for yourself.
Where do you read me as saying “humans have no responsibility over their own safety and health”?
I read the passive voice in your recommendations about insurance and top-down testing as an indication that you don’t think the primary responsibility for preparedness is in individuals. The lack of any recommendation for individual action (have batteries, test and replace them annually, consider whether to leave the area for long-term disruptions) is another data point toward this reading. I apologize if I misunderstood your intent.
I think individuals should take steps to be more prepared, and the main reason they don’t is that the grid’s reliability falls into an awkward valley where it’s reliable enough that you think you can count on it but not so reliable that you should. Planned outages would help fix this, and I expect people would respond by planning.
I agree that power outages kill, in a statistical sense: some will die without A/C, some will eat bad food, etc. I disagree that humans have no responsibility over their own safety and health. Almost all services are provided on a best-efforts basis. Police aren’t liable if a known criminal attacks you. FDA isn’t liable for denying you a life-saving drug. Insurance companies aren’t (despite appearances) money machines—any additional benefit comes with increased premiums, and they’re pretty much never liable for your suffering.
You can argue that (some of) the current California outages are negligent or are negligently handled (not enough notice or assistance to those whose health is impacted). Courts can sort that out, slowly and usually in favor of the more expensive legal team.
In the meantime, if you need power, you need to have enough backup to be able to survive an outage, and to travel somewhere safer if it lasts too long. Whether insurance covers it is a separate issue, unrelated to your ultimate responsibility for yourself.
Where do you read me as saying “humans have no responsibility over their own safety and health”?
I read the passive voice in your recommendations about insurance and top-down testing as an indication that you don’t think the primary responsibility for preparedness is in individuals. The lack of any recommendation for individual action (have batteries, test and replace them annually, consider whether to leave the area for long-term disruptions) is another data point toward this reading. I apologize if I misunderstood your intent.
I think individuals should take steps to be more prepared, and the main reason they don’t is that the grid’s reliability falls into an awkward valley where it’s reliable enough that you think you can count on it but not so reliable that you should. Planned outages would help fix this, and I expect people would respond by planning.