Opinion ID: 703151
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Estoppel/standing

Text: 29 Although the intervenors label their challenge to petitioner's right to raise their claim as an estoppel argument, their argument is more properly characterized as a claim that petitioners lack standing to raise their challenge. Only parties aggrieved by a final Commission order issued under the ICA may bring a petition for review. 28 U.S.C. Sec. 2344 (1988); Shell Oil Co. v. FERC, 47 F.3d 1186, 1200 (D.C.Cir.1995). The intervenors contend that because petitioners supported the change in methodology as it was embodied in the proposed settlement agreement, they cannot now claim to be aggrieved by the change. 30 The intervenors' argument mischaracterizes the factual background of the dispute. It is the general rule that a party may not appeal from a disposition in its favor, Showtime Networks, Inc. v. FCC, 932 F.2d 1, 4 (D.C.Cir.1991), but the Commission's order cannot be fairly characterized as being in petitioners' favor. Petitioners supported a change in methodology, but not the change ultimately ordered. The proposed settlement would have valued the distillate and resid cuts quite differently than does the Commission's methodology, thus altering the relative value assigned to various petroleum streams to the intervenors' detriment. By advocating a specific settlement, petitioners did not forfeit their standing to object to elements of the settlement to which they had agreed if changes made in others by the Commission work to their overall disadvantage. This recognizes the reality that businessmen will yield on particular points if they are satisfied that the net results of an agreement will accrue to their benefit. 31 The sole case cited by the intervenors to support their position, Southern Natural Gas Co. v. FERC, 877 F.2d 1066 (D.C.Cir.1989), is not to the contrary. In that case, we found that the petitioner could not be aggrieved by FERC's denial of an alternative proposal when the Commission granted the one that was actually its first choice. Id. at 1070-71. Here, petitioners' first choice was clearly the settlement as proposed; and Exxon made it clear to the Commission that it preferred the retention of the gravity methodology to the adoption of the assay method as modified by FERC. See Rehearing Order, 66 F.E.R.C. p 61,188 at 61,417. Because the Commission rejected the settlement to which they had agreed, petitioners may challenge the assay methodology as modified by the Order. See Eastern Shore Natural Gas Co., 43 F.E.R.C. p 61,489 at 62,212 (1988) (If [petitioner] does not want to accept the settlement with the modifications that the Commission found were necessary ... [it] can reject the modified settlement and litigate the issues.).