The proposal of Columbia Gas Transmission and Columbia GulfTransmission calling for FERC to allow the negotiation of terms andconditions of pipeline services on their systems would provide a”useful implementation tool for enactment of a generic program,”the American Gas Association says.

The LDC group noted it reached this conclusion when it comparedthe Columbia proposal to the negotiated “principles and procedures”that it and the Interstate Natural Gas Association of America(INGAA) espoused in a proposal submitted to the Commission in May.It believes FERC foremost should move ahead with a negotiatedpolicy on a generic basis, and then it should use the Columbiapipelines as vehicles to carry out the program.

The Columbia proposal, which was submitted to FERC in June,falls short of the AGA plan in a couple of areas, AGA conceded, butit believes this can be ironed out. For example, Columbia’s filing”fails to incorporate” AGA’s two-step process, which calls for apipeline to establish a high-quality recourse service by filing atFERC a benchmark for its recourse service, and to list the termsand conditions that would be non-negotiable.

“To the extent that this can be accomplished through an informalsettlement-type process, filing of comments at FERC, or eventhrough meetings between Columbia and its customers and amendmentto the filing, this infirmity of the proposal can be overcome,” AGAtold FERC last week [RP98-249, RP98-250].

The fact that the Commission seems headed towards reforming itscomplaint procedures in a “timely manner” should bode well for theColumbia proposal as well, AGA said. It believes “Columbia’s filingshould continue to be given serious consideration as it has beenfiled on a prospective basis only.” However, it emphasized thatactual negotiated services shouldn’t be allowed until an expeditedcomplaint process is in place.

The AGA noted that Columbia deferred the issue of allocation ofcosts between customized and recourse services to its next generalrate case. Although it also failed to address the same issue in itsMay proposal, the LDC group said it has been “very clear” in thepast about its position on the issue – “that is, negotiatedrates/services should not shift costs to recourse customers andcosts must be properly allocated between recourse service andnegotiated services.”

Susan Parker

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