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REHEARING; COURT REVIEW OF ORDERS

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SEC. 19 (a) Any person, State, municipality, or State commission aggrieved by an order issued by the Commission in a proceeding under this act to which such person, State, municipality, or State commission is a party may apply for a rehearing within thirty days after the issuance of such order. The application for rehearing shall set forth specifically the ground or grounds upon which such application is based. Upon such application the Commission shall have power to grant or deny rehearing or to abrogate or modify its order without further hearing. Unless the Commission acts upon the application for rehearing within thirty days after it is filed, such application may be deemed to have been denied. No proceeding to review any order of the Commission shall be brought by any person unless such person shall have made application to the Commission for a rehearing thereon. Until the record in a proceeding shall have been filed in a court of appeals, as provided in subsection (b), the Commission may at any time, upon reasonable notice and in such manner as it shall deem proper, modify or set aside, in whole or in part, any finding or order made or issued by it under the provisions of this Act.

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(b) Any party to a proceeding under this act aggrieved by an order issued by the Commission in such proceeding may obtain a review of such order in the circuit court of appeals of the United States 10 for any circuit wherein the natural-gas company to which the order relates is located or has its principal place of business, or in the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, by filing in such court, within sixty days after the order of the Commission upon the application for rehearing, a written petition praying that the order of the Commission be modified or set aside in whole or in part. A copy of such petition shall forthwith be transmitted by the clerk of the court to any member of the Commission and thereupon the Commission shall file with the court the record upon which the order complained of was entered, as provided in section 2112 of title 28, United States Code. Upon the filing of such petition such court shall have jurisdiction, which upon the filing of the record with it shall be exclusive, to affirm, modify, or set aside such order in whole or

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(c) No natural-gas company or person which will be a natural-gas company upon completion of any proposed construction or extension shall engage in the transportation or sale of natural gas, subject to the jurisdiction of the Commission, or undertake the construction or extension of any facilities therefor, or acquire or operate any such facilities or extensions thereof, unless there is in force with respect to such natural-gas company a certificate of public convenience and necessity issued by the Commission authorizing such acts or operations: Provided, however, That if any such natural-gas company or predecessor in interest was bona fide engaged in transportation or sale of natural gas, subject to the jurisdiction of the Commission, on the effective date of this amendatory Act, over the route or routes or within the area for which application is made and has so operated since that time, the Commission shall issue such certificate without requiring further proof that public convenience and necessity will be served by such operation, and without further proceedings, if application for such certificate is made to the Commission within ninety days after the effective date of this amendatory Act. Pending the determination of any such application, the continuance of such operation shall be lawful.

In all other cases the Commission shall set the matter for hearing and shall give such reasonable notice of the hearing thereon to all interested persons as in its judgment may be necessary under rules and regulations to be prescribed by the Commission; and the application shall be decided in accordance with the procedure provided in subsection (e) of this section and such certificate shall be issued or denied accordingly: Provided, however, That the Commission may issue a temporary certificate in cases of emergency, to assure maintenance of adequate service or to serve particular customers, without notice or hearing, pending the determination of an application for a certificate, and may by regulation exempt from the requirements of this section temporary acts or operations for which the issuance of a certificate will not be required in the public interest. [52 Stat. 825 (1938), as amended, 56 Stat. 83 (1942); 15 U. S. C. § 717f (c)]*

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT

HUGOTON-ANADARKO AREA RATE CASE

THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA, and
THE PUBLIC UTILITIES COMMISSION OF THE
STATE OF CALIFORNIA,

On Petition for Review of Orders of the
Federal Power Commission-Docket No. AR64-1

Before: HAMLEY, KOELSCII and DUNIWAY, Circuit Judges HAMLEY, Circuit Judge:

The People of the State of California and The Public Utilitics Commission of the State of California (petitioners), proceeding under section 19(b) of the Natural Gas Act (Act), 15 U.S.C. §717r, filed a joint petition in this court to review Opinion No. 586 and accompanying order of the Federal Power Commission (Commission). The opinion and order are reported at 44 F.P.C.. 761 (1970). The American Public Gas Association, City of Chicago, Illinois, and City and County of Denver, Colorado, have jointly intervened here in favor of petitioners' petition and are collectively referred to herein as the consumer-intervenors.

The Commission's Opinion No. 586, and accompanying order, issued on September 18, 1970, determines rates for natural gas

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The People of the State of California, et al. vs.

produced in the Hugoton-Anadarko Area.1 Numerous natural gas producing, transmission and distribution companies, some individuals and a trust have intervened here in favor of respondent Commission's position.2

By its order of November 27, 1963, 30 F.P.C. 1354, the Commission instituted a proceeding, pursuant to sections 4, 5, 10, 14, 15 and 16 of the Act (15 U.S.C. §§ 717c, d, i, m, n and o), to determine the just and reasonable rate or rates for the sales of natural gas subject to the jurisdiction of the Commission, produced in the Hugoton-Anadarko Area (Docket No. AR6-1-1), as well as for the Texas Gulf Coast Area (Docket No. AR64-2).3

1The Hugoton-Anadarko Area, one of the oldest gas-producing areas in the world, is comprised of the state of Kansas, Texas Railroad Commission District No. 10, the Oklahoma Panhandle (six counties), and the Anadarko Basin of Oklahoma (fifteen counties). The Hugoton and Panhandle Fields are the largest known gas fields in the United States. 2The intervenors who have filed individual or joint briefs supporting the Commission herein are: The Northern Distributor Group (Central Telephone and Utilities Corporation, Iowa Electric Light and Power Company, Iowa-Illinois Gas and Electric Company, Iowa Tower and Light Company, Iowa Public Service Company, Metropolitan Utilities District of Omaha Minneapolis Gas Company, Northern States Power Company [Minnesota], Northern States Power Company [Wisconsin], and Northwestern Public Service Company), Amoco Production Company, Mobil Oil Corporation, Northern Natural Gas Production Company, Shell Oil Company, Diamond Shamrock Corporation, Amerada Hess Corporation, Getty Oil Company, Atlantic Richfield Company, Humble Oil & Re.ining Company, Cabot Corporation, Hunt Oil Company, H. L. Hunt, Caroline Hunt Sands, A. G. Hill, Alinda Hunt Hill, Secure Trust, Cities Service Oil Company, Placid Oil Company, Tenneco Oil Company, Sohio Petroleum Company, Texaco, Inc., The Superior Oil Company, Continental Oil Company, Phillips Petroleum Company, Marathon Oil Company, Dorchester Gas Producing Co., Skelly Oil Company, Gulf Oil Corporation, Sun Oil Company, Helmerich-Payne, Inc., Warren Petroleum Corporation and Pipeline Intervenors (Cities Service Gas Company, Kansas-Nebraska Natural Gas Company, Inc., Colorado Interstate Gas Company, Natural Gas Pipeline Company of America, El Paso Natural Gas Company, Northern Natural Gas Company, Panhandle Eastern Pipe Line Company, and Trauswestern Pipeline Company).

3These two proceedings are two of a number of arca rate cases that the Commission has been conducting to fix just and reasonable rates to be charged by producers of natural gas to pipeline companies for sale in interstate commerce. Such area rate cases are the means devised by the

Federal Power Commission

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The Commission named several hundred respondents in the Hugoton-Anadarko portion of the joint proceeding. Joint hearings were held in these area rate proceedings.4 The record in Docket No. AR61-1 (Jugoton-Anadarko) comprises one hundred and eighty-one joint and thirty-seven separate hearing volumes containing 28,650 pages; one hundred and thirty-four joint and seventy-three separate exhibits; and nineteen joint exhibits incorporated by reference from other arca rate proceedings. The hearings commenced September 14, 1965 and concluded January 27, 1967.

On May 24, 1968, certain parties filed a Petition for Promulgation of Settlement Proposal. Responses were received from numerous parties; but the Commission took no action with respect to this settlement proposal. On September 16, 1968, FPC Examiner Max L. Kane issued his two-hundred-and-fifty-eight-page decision proposing rates in the Hugoton-Anadarko Area. This initial decision divides the rate structure as between the ancient, shallow, low-pressure Hugoton-Panhandle Field and the so-called Other Fields, which are newer, deeper and of higher pressure than the Hugoton-Panhandle Field. The initial decision established one set of prices for "new gas" from all fields and “old gas" from the Other Fields, and another set of prices for "old gas" from the IIugoton-Panhandle Field.5

Following the submission of briefs on exceptions, the Coinmission heard oral argument on October 31, 1969, in the IIgoton Anadarko proceeding as well as in the Texas Gulf Coast Area

Commission to cope with the problem of producer-rate regulation thrust upon it by the decision of the Supreme Court in Phillips Petroleum Co. v. Wisconsin, 347 U.S. 672 (1954).

4The Commission later severed from these joint proceedings the issue of the proper method to be used in pricing natural gas produced by pipelines or their affiliates. 35 F.P.C. 497 (1966). The FPC's final decision in the severed proceeding (Opinion No. 568, Pipeline Production Area Rate Proceeding, 42 F.P.C. 738 (1969) was affirmed, with certain caveats, in City of Chicago, Illinois v. Federal Power Commission, 458 F.2d 731 (D.C. Cir. December 2, 1971).

5In the Examiner's decision, the term "new gas" refers to gas produced under contracts executed after January 1, 1961. See 44 F.P.C. 761, 768, n. 3 (1970). The Commission's Opinion No. 586, however, refers to "new gas" as gas produced under contracts executed after November 1, 1969. See 44 F.P.C. 761, 786-787 (1970).