Someone wants to borrow $1.4 billion from you.

They have a history of playing fast and loose with money.

In the past 20 years they’ve had two bankruptcies.

And to top it off, they are a convicted felon based on their guilty plea to 85 manslaughter charges.

Would you go ahead and lend them the money, but not be clear on the details of how you will be paid back, and how much you could be on the hook for if certain benchmarks weren’t met?

Sounds like a stupid question.

But then again, never underestimate the shallow grasp the California Legislature has when it comes to sound financial decisions.

Remember, these are the same people who burned through a $97.5 billion surplus that they had on hand 22 months ago so irresponsibly that today they are facing a $73 billion deficit.

A growing number of lawmakers are now questioning whether a $1.4 billion loan they approved for PG&E in September 2022 at the urging of Gov. Gavin Newsom is going to leave California taxpayers holding the bag for $300 million.

The $1.4 billion loan was to keep Diablo Canyon up and running.

So why the nuclear power plant that the forces pushing for all-green power in California wanted to rid the state of even it was using a non-fossil fuel to generate electricity and therefore wasn’t a factor in manmade climate change?

Imagine what would happen tomorrow as a PG&E customer if you had no choice but to cut your electricity use in half and face the threat of brownouts — a nicer way of saying blackouts — caused by insufficient generation of electricity.

The Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant accounts for 49 percent of the electricity PG&E sells to 16 million customers throughout Central and Northern California.

It accounts for 9 percent of all electricity California consumes.

One reactor was scheduled to go off line for good this year.

The other reactor was to follow suit in 2025.

Three years ago, it dawned on the architects of the state-mandated 100 percent renewable energy mandate that eschews any fossil-based fuel to generate electricity that California was heading for a cliff.

A cliff created by state mandated electricity be produced from green renewables and their original decision to force the shutdown of California’s last remaining nuclear power plant.

The Golden State is not putting in place renewables such as solar, wind, and geothermal plus battery storage fast enough to meet state-imposed mandates to replace “dirty” energy.

At the same time the state was also creating greater electricity demands with mandates to rid fossil fuels from serving as a power source for trucks and cars.

They added one plus one and got the equivalent of minus two.

What they didn’t want — at least those who had politics in their DNA and weren’t hardcore green zealous — was to look like a bunch of Keystone Cop environmentalists driving California into the abyss.

If they plunged California into Third World status by pulling the plug on Diablo Canyon, it would trigger a tsunami across the United States setting back climate initiatives by years if not decades.

That’s when the plan was made by green politicians to extend PG&E operating life through 2030.

Of course, PG&E played the “poor” card.

They couldn’t afford to do the necessary work needed to keep the nuclear reactors up and running for another five years.

So they sought out their preferred banker, or is that mark, to lend them the $1.4 billion to do the work — the State of California.

Newsom helped draw up the terms of the loan.

PG&E would pay the state back from federal Department of Energy grants. And what those grants don’t cover would come from “excess revenue” — read that profit — in the final year of Diablo Canyon’s operations.

Based on PG&E’s record profit of $2.2 billion last year that shouldn’t be a problem.

If they generated that much money in 2030, they could pay off the entire loan if they didn’t receive a cent from the federal government and still have $800 million left over.

The federal government, it turns out, is only giving PG&E $1.1 billion.

No big deal, right?

PG&E should be able to cover the shortfall by dipping into “excess revenue” in 2030.

Now people like State Sen. Scott Weiner are sounding the alarm after they voted for the desk.

They are worried the state’s general fund will be on the hook for the $300 million shortfall.

Weiner et al must know something that the bureaucrats they entrusted oversee the loan don’t.

Delphine Hou, the California Department of Water Resources deputy director, who is charged to do just that, sees no problem.

“It is incorrect to assume the loan won’t be paid back,” Hou said.

Weiner is essentially saying the opposite — it is incorrect to assume the loan “will” be paid back.

Given the fact PG&E went more than 5 years without paying a penny in federal taxes while making billions upon billions in profits, shows their small army of lawyers and tax accountants have the wherewithal to make it so they don’t pay back a cent of the $300 million to the state.

The $300 million question is why language has PG&E only on the hook for any shortfall in the final year of Diablo Canyon’s extended operation.

Why wasn’t there language that PG&E would pay it back from profits before shareholders were paid?

And if there is an unpaid shortfall interest should have been required starting on Jan. 1, 2031.

Weiner & Co. are clearly having remorse over agreeing to the deal they did.

All of this could have been avoided as PG&E could have funded the necessary work out of annual profits or at least used them for a short-term loan.

But why do that?

The No. 1 priority of the state legislature and the PG&E lapdogs at the California Public Utilities Commission is to protect PG&E profits.

And in case you’re wondering how they are expected to do that, PG&E currently has no less than a dozen rate hike requests at the CPUC.

This column is the opinion of editor, Dennis Wyatt, and does not necessarily represent the opinions of The Bulletin or 209 Multimedia. He can be reached at dwyatt@mantecabulletin.com