Court Opinion

ID: 9615748
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 04:40:17.523005+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:03:51.374645
License: Public Domain

STEWART, Justice
(dissenting):
The Commission’s order did not retroactively change the rates paid for electricity. What the order apparently did was to adjust the Energy Balancing Account (EBA) so that additional nontariff revenues are attributable to the company, rather than the ratepayers. Whether that “accounting adjustment,” as Utah Power and Light (UP & L) calls it, constitutes retroactive rate-making is not clear to me on the facts of this case because the Commission’s findings simply do not explain how the EBA operates, especially with respect to the inclusion in that account of jurisdictional and nonjurisdictional revenues,- rather than just fuel costs. Furthermore, I think the concept of retroactive rate-making is more complicated than the majority opinion indicates, and might not apply in this case. Since the Commission’s findings of fact and conclusions of law fail to explain adequate*425ly the reasons for its action and the actual manner of operation of the EBA, I am not able to reach a conclusion as to whether the adjustment was illegal. The difficulty is highlighted by UP & L’s suggestion that the Commission’s order establishing the EBA is unlawful. Since UP & L did not appeal that order when it was entered, did not raise the issue on a cross-appeal in the instant case, and has not really briefed it, the issue cannot now be raised. But the EBA does appear to have produced distortions in the company’s accounting procedures. Whether those distortions favor the company or the ratepayer in the long run is simply not dealt with in the findings.
I would remand the case to the Commission for additional findings.
HOWE, J., concurs in the dissenting opinion of STEWART, J.