Despite taking its massive utility into Chapter 11 bankruptcy proceedings last year, PG&E Corp. reported Wednesday it handed out $4.68 million in bonuses to 11 top corporate and utility senior executives, along with $13.5 million in restricted stock, as rewards for performances resulting in $1.1 billion in profits last year. The disclosure was part of a filing to the Securities and Exchange Commission, prompting strong criticism from consumer groups.

A spokesperson for the utility consumer watchdog group The Utility Reform Network (TURN) called the bonuses “obscene,” and the Santa Monica-based Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights accused the utility holding company of basing the pay-outs on “phantom earnings” created by a large retail electric utility rate increase last June that was followed by a steep drop in the wholesale cost of natural gas and electricity, leaving excessive “headroom.”

PG&E’s utility, Pacific Gas and Electric Co., is attempting to get its proposed reorganization plan approved in federal bankruptcy court, at which time the extra headroom and refinancing through utility spin-off companies would allow the utility to pay some $13 billion to creditors. Southern California Edison Co, on the other hand, is applying the headroom, plus bridge financing, to pay off some $5 billion to creditors this month, using a federal court settlement with the California Public Utilities Commission as the basis for its financial bailout.

In PG&E’s report of the bonuses, CEO Robert Glynn was listed at getting $1.18 million and $3 million in stock with selling restrictions on top of a $900,000 annual salary, which was unchanged from the previous year. Gordon R. Smith, the utility CEO, received $630,000 in salary, $664,808 in bonuses and $1.23 million in stock for 2001, while the head of the nonutility National Energy Group, Tom Boren, received $690,000 in salary, $679,478 in bonuses, and $1.75 million of stock.

PG&E gave no bonuses in 2000 when it reported a $3.4 billion loss due to skyrocketing wholesale power prices it faced without full coverage in its retail utility rates. The rewards for 2001 are along the same lines as what PG&E handed out for 1999, the last pre-crisis year.

©Copyright 2002 Intelligence Press Inc. Allrights reserved. The preceding news report may not be republishedor redistributed, in whole or in part, in any form, without priorwritten consent of Intelligence Press, Inc.