FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE November 17, 1997

PG&E CORP'.S GLYNN OUTLINES FOR BUSINESS LEADERS THE COMING CHANGES IN THE ELECTRIC INDUSTRY

PG&E Corporation CEO and President Robert D. Glynn, Jr., told business leaders in Fresno today that changes in the nation's annual $250 billion energy market will bring significant customer benefits.

Industry restructuring will also force dramatic structural and organizational changes for energy companies throughout the country, said Glynn.

"Across the nation, energy consumers stand on the threshold of being able to purchase electricity--for the first time--from competitive energy providers, not only from their local utility companies," said Glynn. "As this change unfolds, consumers will benefit significantly, and so energy companies will change dramatically to take advantage of new competitive energy markets. It's a huge change, a huge opportunity for consumers to lower their energy costs, and a huge opportunity for energy companies to prosper as national energy providers."

Leading the nation in this change are areas in California and the Northeast, said Glynn. In California, residential and small commercial customers will receive a 10 percent electricity price reduction beginning next year as part of the state's restructuring plan.

"In aggregate, (customers in California) will save about two-thirds of a billion dollars in 1998 alone," said Glynn. "This represents true disposable income that these customers can use for any purpose they choose."

And, according to California Governor Pete Wilson, deregulation of the electric industry will save California schools more that $123 million by the year 2002. "That's enough money to hire 3,000 new teachers, to build 1,600 new classrooms or to purchase a million and a half sets of reading materials," said Glynn. "These are real economic savings that will begin in 1998, continue for about four years, after which energy prices are expected to drop again significantly."

Supporting this change in California is landmark energy legislation, said Glynn, which was endorsed by a broad coalition of consumer groups and unanimously approved by the legislature and signed by Governor Wilson in the Fall of 1996. This legislation ensures change at a rapid pace, provides immediate rate reductions for residential customers, protects reliability, preserves California's pro-environment energy policies, and ensures consumer protection to avoid the abuses that occurred when the telecommunications industry was deregulated.

"As we stand on the verge of the 21st Century, it is fitting that, once again, California is in the forefront of change," said Glynn. "The savings are big and they are real. And in California, they are less than 70 days away."

And while the utility industry itself is being transformed, so are many companies around the nation, like PG&E Corporation, which will compete for customers based on price, reliability and quality of customer service, said Glynn.

What started out as Pacific Gas and Electric Company, a utility that has operated in Northern and Central California for nearly a century, has now grown into PG&E Corporation, parent company to this regulated utility as well as four non-regulated subsidiary companies.

For several decades, explained Glynn, the company has had a natural gas transportation business, which is now called PG&E Gas Transmission. It owns and operates pipelines in the Pacific Northwest, Texas, and Australia.

In the 1980's, the company, in a joint venture with Bechtel Enterprises, formed an independent power generating business called U.S. Generating Company (USGen) that today operates in eight states across the country. Earlier this year, PG&E Corporation acquired Bechtel's share of USGen and next year, USGen expects to complete the acquisition of 18 fossil and hydroelectric power plants in the New England region.

Earlier, PG&E Corporation formed PG&E Energy Trading and PG&E Energy Services. PG&E Energy Trading specializes in providing gas and electric commodity trading services to regulated utilities and large end-use customers throughout North America. PG&E Energy Services provides competitively priced electricity, gas and related energy services directly to retail customers.

"National generation, national gas pipelines, national energy trading and services businesses, and a strong California utility, that is what's happening to PG&E Corporation as deregulation unfolds," said Glynn

CONTACT:
Greg S. Pruett (415) 973-5900

Editors: Please note, PG&E Corporation is the proper name for the energy services holding company which trades on the NYSE under symbol PCG. Please do not use Pacific Gas and Electric when referring to the holding company. Effective Jan. 1., 1997, Pacific Gas and Electric Company became one of five subsidiaries of PG&E Corp.