2. Procedural History

Notice of the application appeared in the Commission's Daily Calendar on June 20, 2005. Resolution ALJ 176-3155 dated June 30, 2005, preliminarily categorized the application as ratesetting and determined that hearings were necessary. A prehearing conference was held on July 14, 2005 and an Assigned Commissioner's Ruling on the scope of the proceeding was subsequently issued on July 27, 2005. The scoping ruling confirmed that this was ratesetting proceeding and evidentiary hearings were necessary.

Testimony was served on January 18, 2006 by the Division of Ratepayer Advocates (DRA), The Utility Reform Network (TURN), Californians for Renewable Energy, Inc., The South San Joaquin Irrigation District (SSJID), The School Project for Utility Rate Reduction (SPURR), Hunt Technologies and Cellnet Technologies, e-Meter, and The County of Yolo and Cities of Davis, West Sacramento, and Woodland (Yolo/Cities). PG&E, DRA and TURN served rebuttal testimony on February 8, 2006. Evidentiary hearings were held between February 28 - March 16, 2006. The Silicon Valley Leadership Group (SVLG) was permitted to intervene late on February 28, 2006. Also, SVLG was permitted to serve late testimony. Opening briefs were filed by all parties on April 3, 2006 and reply briefs on April 14, 2006.

The record is composed of all documents that were filed and served on parties. It also includes all testimony and exhibits6 received at hearing and late-filed exhibits as ordered by the Administrative Law Judge (ALJ). Also, the ALJ sealed as confidential various exhibits and portions of the transcript and allowed TURN and PG&E to file portions of briefs as confidential. We affirm all ALJ rulings on confidentiality.

DRA and PG&E entered into a number of evidentiary stipulations, all of which were reduced to writing and admitted as exhibits.7 As a result of the stipulations, PG&E and DRA now agree on the project installation and deployment costs, and all operational benefits and costs. No other party opposed the stipulations.8 We find that these stipulations are within the range of reasonable outcome if the matters were fully litigated on the existing record. Therefore, we will adopt the stipulations. We find, based upon the prepared testimony, that DRA has performed sufficient competent analysis to enter into an informed agreement with PG&E in the various stipulations. We adopt the final calculation of operational benefits and costs as modified by the stipulations, and as discussed herein.

6 There were 110 exhibits received into evidence - many were large multi-chaptered documents sponsored by several witnesses.

7 Exs. 16, 17, 19, 20, 28 and 29.

8 TURN broadly opposed the AMI project, including its costs, benefits and other issues, but it raised no objection to the stipulations. Our adoption of the stipulation denies any of TURN's remaining objections on these issues.

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