FERC announced yesterday that it has scheduled a public conference for later this month to address the state of “current and projected” interstate gas pipeline capacity to the California market, as well as explore what is driving the higher gas prices in the southern end of the state.

Chairman Curt Hebert Jr. revealed the Commission plans for the May 24 conference after Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) criticized the Commission for failing to tackle high gas prices as part of its April 26 decision to mitigate wholesale power prices in the troubled California energy market. “The price of natural gas in Southern California is still three times higher than the rest of the country,” she complained during a Senate committee oversight hearing Thursday on FERC’s price-mitigation order.

In testimony before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, Commissioner William Massey agreed that FERC needed to deal with the prices of both power and natural gas. “I’ve concluded that we will never get a handle on electricity prices, unless we get a handle on gas prices.”

In addition to the interstate capacity market, the staff conference will review the “current and projected” capacity of California’s intrastate pipelines, the physical and operational interconnection between the interstate and intrastate transportation systems, “current and projected” demand for natural gas in the state and the allocation of intrastate capacity in California, as well as the drivers behind gas prices.

The conference will be divided into two stages — one for factual presentations and the other for discussion. Those interested in making presentations or participating in discussions should send a letter to the secretary of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission by May 14 at 888 First St., NE, Washington, DC 20426. The letter should contain the docket number — PL01-4-000. For those interested in making presentations, the request should indicate the topic of the presentation.

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