Upholds

A federal appeals court in Washington, DC, Friday said FERC acted reasonably when it decided to reclassify as unregulated gathering only a portion of the “massive” network of pipeline facilities that Transcontinental Gas Pipe Line Corp. sought to spin down to affiliate Williams Gas Processing-Gulf Coast Co. (WGP).

An administrative law judge (ALJ) last week recommended that the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission throw out the complaints filed by PacifiCorp against four power brokers, saying the complaints attempting to break contracts worth about $67 million are “in essence an attack on the validity of market-based rates… If [PacifiCorp] is correct, no contract made under market-based rate authority is valid,” and “no reasonable seller of electricity at wholesale in interstate commerce would seek or use market-based rate authority.”

An administrative law judge (ALJ) has recommended that the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission throw out the complaints filed by PacifiCorp against four power brokers, saying the complaints attempting to break contracts worth about $67 million are “in essence an attack on the validity of market-based rates… If [PacifiCorp] is correct, no contract made under market-based rate authority is valid.

A federal appeals court in Washington, DC has rejected a shipper challenge to three FERC orders that allowed Transcontinental Gas Pipe Line Corp. to roll in the construction costs of several East Coast expansion projects in its general rate base. The agency orders required all Transco shippers to pay the project construction costs — not just those who would benefit directly from the expansions.

A federal appeals court in Washington, DC has rejected a shipper challenge to three FERC orders that allowed Transcontinental Gas Pipe Line Corp. to roll in the construction costs of several East Coast expansion projects in its general rate base. The agency orders required all Transco shippers to pay the project construction costs — not just those who would benefit directly from the expansions.

The US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit upheld FERC’s decision in the Sea Robin Pipeline case, in which the Commission reformulated its test for determining whether a pipeline in the Gulf of Mexico is a nonjurisdictional gathering line or a jurisdictional transmission system. ExxonMobil Gas Marketing had filed an appeal of FERC’s determination that a portion of the 438-mile, 1.3 Bcf/d Sea Robin Pipeline system upstream of the Vermilion 149 station is nonjurisdictional gathering.

In a reversal of its prior position, a federal appeals court has upheld FERC’s decision on remand reaffirming Tennessee Gas Pipeline’s switch in 1996 to the more competitive net-present-value (NPV) method for allocating pipeline capacity and primary receipt/delivery points on its system. Prior to 1996, the pipeline had offered capacity and primary points on a less competitive “first come, first-served” basis.

A U.S. district judge has upheld an arbitration award in a natural gas monopoly lawsuit against Duke Energy Fuels LLP and Duke Energy Field Services Inc. (DEFS), ruling that Duke illegally maintained its monopoly power in the gas processing market in Panola County, TX. The ruling rejected Duke’s attempt to vacate an earlier award to provide a gas processing contract on competitive terms to American Central Eastern Texas Gas Co. LLP and American Central Gas Cos. Inc.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit on Friday upheld much of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission’s mammoth and hotly contested Order 637, which removed prices caps in the short-term capacity release market on a two-year experimental basis.