Berkshire’s PacifiCorp to pay $250 million to timber companies over Oregon wildfires

By Clark Mindock

(Reuters) -PacifiCorp, an Oregon electric utility owned by billionaire Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE:), has agreed to pay $250 million to logging companies whose commercial timber burned during wildfires in Oregon in 2020, the company said on Monday.

The settlement covers damages incurred by Oregon timber companies that accused PacifiCorp of improperly failing to shut down power lines during a Labor Day windstorm in 2020, leading to fires that caused an estimated $1.2 billion in damage in the state.

Mikal Watts, an attorney for the timber industry plaintiffs and others suing the company, said his clients “lost tens of thousands of acres of valuable timberlands” from the fires in Douglas County.

A PacifiCorp spokesperson said the wildfires were “undeniably tragic” and that it is pleased to resolve the matter on behalf of impacted customers and communities. The company said it is working to find solutions to address wildfires.

An Oregon jury in June had found PacifiCorp liable in prior lawsuits involving four of the Labor Day weekend blazes and ordered the company to pay a combined $90 million in compensatory and punitive damages to 17 property owners for its negligence.

The verdict left PacifiCorp vulnerable to potentially billions of dollars of damages to approximately 5,000 other plaintiffs who said the fires damaged their properties.

Earlier this month, the company reached a $299 million settlement with 463 plaintiffs impacted by one of the fires in southern Oregon.

   The utility had said that power shutoffs were not necessary based on what it knew. No official cause of the fires has been determined by U.S. or Oregon officials, the company says.

   Acquired for $5.1 billion in 2006, PacifiCorp is owned by Berkshire Hathaway Energy, which is 92% owned by Berkshire Hathaway.