Opinion ID: 339939
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: The Present Problems

Text: 166 There is, in the litigation before us, no demurrer to the Commission's jurisdiction to deal, as between Texas Eastern and the customers to which Opinion No. 565 applies, with any rate reductions or refunds receivable by Texas Eastern from the producers. 547 The gas in question entered Texas Eastern's pipeline at Rayne Field in Louisiana, and was transmitted and sold to distributors in other states for purposes of resale to the public. 548 No less than the producer's sales of the gas to Texas Eastern 549 were Texas Eastern's sales of the gas to those distributors activities within the regulatory domain of the Commission. 550 No narrower than the Commission's jurisdiction to prescribe rate reductions and refunds in the one case 551 was its jurisdiction to allocate the resulting benefits in the other. 552 And not less potent than the Commission's authority to allocate such benefits in ratemaking proceedings 553 was its authority to do so in section 7 proceedings. 554 The questions we encounter in connection with such allocations are not questions of Commission power, but are of an entirely different order. 167 We have held that the Commission cannot defer longer the rate reductions and refunds by the producers of Texas Eastern which conventionalization of the parties' lease-sale agreement demands. 555 In consequence, we have rejected the directives of Opinion No. 565-A and its accompanying order that disposition of reduction and refund issues be postponed. 556 We have also held that the producer refunds are to be computed on the basis of the just and reasonable rate of 18.5 cents per Mcf from the time at which Texas Eastern began to transmit the gas it drew from Rayne Field. 557 For that reason, we have disapproved so much of Opinion No. 565 as would have predicated the refunds on the 20-cent in-line price for slightly more than the first nine years of the production period. 558 These adjudications necessitate resolution of the problems related to allocation of the benefits of the rate reductions and refunds as between Texas Eastern and its customers. 168 We do not approach these problems on the broad premise that invalidity of an administrative decision undertaking to change an earlier administrative decision invariably reinstates the earlier decision. We realize that the agency may legally have a choice as to the action it will take in the matter, and that a court may not be able to say that the agency, had it known that the later decision would not pass judicial muster, would have left the earlier decision as its final action. On the other hand, it is obviously unnecessary to indulge further administrative consideration of problems as to which but one solution is legally open. 169 The Commission's power to modify its prior orders, we have said, is confined to changes which it may find necessary or appropriate to carry out the provisions of the Act. 559 Save as to the amounts of the allocations, 560 Opinion No. 565's treatment of flow-through of the rate reductions and refunds, we find, is fully consistent with policies fundamental to the Act. 561 On the other hand, deferment of flow-through issues--like deferment of the rate-reduction and refund issues themselves--which the Commission majority decreed in Opinion No. 565-A, we further find, in no way serves to foster the provisions or purposes of the Act. 562 We ultimately conclude, then, that Opinion No. 565, insofar as it effectuates legal mandates, is to be sustained as the Commission for further consideration in accordance with this opinion. 170