The Toxic Bubble of Technical Debt Threatening America

#News(General) [ via IoTGroup ]

And sure, let accountability fall on PG&E, the California Public Utilities Commission, and whomever else.
A kind of toxic debt is embedded in much of the infrastructure that America built during the 20th century.
For decades, corporate executives, as well as city, county, state, and federal officials, not to mention voters, have decided against doing the routine maintenance and deeper upgrades to ensure that electrical systems, roads, bridges, dams, and other infrastructure can function properly under a range of conditions.
But it’s really borrowing against the future, without putting that debt on the books.
Like other kinds of debt, this debt compounds if you don’t deal with it, and it can distort the true cost of decisions.
PG&E’s balance sheets are now fully on view, thanks to the company’s massive liabilities from recent fires, which have landed it in bankruptcy court.
So it’s likely that PG&E customers will be living with higher rates, rolling blackouts, and the possibility of power lines starting new fires.
No matter what decisions anyone makes now, everyone hooked up to the grid in Northern California is likely going to receive worse service even as we all collectively pay more to harden the system against fire.
This is what runaway technical debt looks like.
Almost everywhere you look in the built environment, toxic technical-debt bubbles are growing and growing and growing.
This is true of privately maintained systems such as PG&E’s and publicly maintained systems such as that of Chicago’s Department of Water Management.
It’s extremely true of roads: Soon, perhaps 50 percent of Bay Area roads will be in some state of disrepair, not to mention the deeper work that must occur to secure the roadbeds, not just the asphalt on top.
Cities are forced to make impossible decisions between funding different services.
So, water systems in the United States have built up a $1 trillion technical debt, which must be paid over the next 25 years.

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