VIII. Motions

Concurrently with its post-hearing brief, LBG LLC filed a motion to become a party. No party opposed LBG's motion and LBG is an integral player in this proceeding since it is the counter-party with SCE to the contract in question. LBG's motion is granted, it is afforded party status, and its brief was read and considered.

Simultaneously with Comments, MID Districts filed a Motion to Intervene seeking leave to file Comments. Previously in this proceeding, MID Districts entered "Information Only" appearances and sought to change to "Party" status. In summary, both Modesto and Merced Districts are customers of PG&E and competitors in the provision of electric services to customers in California's Central Valley. While the MID Districts are not located in SCE's service territory, they are concerned with the overall policy issue of allocating the costs and benefits of IOU resources and sought leave to file comments to preserve their rights in connection with this issue. While revisiting the cost/benefit allocation mechanism adopted in D.06-07-029 is not within the scope of this proceeding, MID Districts' Motion is granted and their Comments accepted.

SCE filed a Motion to File Confidential Version of Brief Under Seal, with a proposed Protective Order, concurrently with its post-hearing brief on December 18, 2006. The Motion was unopposed. SCE's Motion to File Confidential Version of Brief Under Seal is hereby granted with the Proposed Protective Order.

Also concurrently with its post-hearing brief, SCE filed a motion requesting the Commission to take Official Notice of the CEC Report. This Report was presented at the Joint Agency Energy Action Plan Meeting on December 11, 2006, the same day as the evidentiary hearings in this case. Therefore, the Report was not available for review, analysis and cross-examination at the time of the hearing.

DRA opposed SCE's Motion and simultaneously filed a Motion to Strike portions of SCE's December 18, 2006 Brief that references the CEC Report. In summary, DRA asks the Commission to weigh the unfairness to other parties if SCE were allowed to introduce new and untested evidence at this late date. We did weigh DRA's request and determined that even without the benefit of scrutiny and cross-examination, the CEC Report is helpful to the Commission. As discussed above, this is not an application that SCE conjured up out of whole cloth. The August ACR directed SCE to proceed as it did and to bring any resources that could be on-line by August 1, 2007 to us for consideration. The CEC Report assists the Commission's analysis of the LBG contract. Knowing that the CEC counted on the 260 MW from the LBG project in making its Stage 1, 2 and 3 probabilities is useful information. While it is not determinative to our decision, the fact that the probability is 99% that SP26 will have sufficient resources to avoid a Stage 3 situation with the addition of the LBG contract and the other resources directed in the August ACR, versus a 93% probability of a Stage 3 crisis without the new resources, helps tip the balance in favor of the LBG contract.

We, therefore, deny DRA's Motion to Strike and grant SCE's Request for Official Notice. We did consider the CEC Report in making our decision.

Concurrently with its Reply Comments, LBG filed a Request for Official Notice of three documents: (1) Letter of January 19, 2007 from President and Chief Executive Officer of the CAISO, Yakout Mansour; (2) January 5, 2007 Letter from Kenneth Coats from the South Coast Air Quality Management District; and (3) January 17, 2007 Letter from Robert Kantor of the Port of Long Beach. LBG asks that the Commission take official notice of documents # 2 and 3 under Evidence Code Section 452(c) and extend the umbrella of the rules of official notice to the CAISO letter.

LBG's Request for Official Notice for all three documents is granted and it is noted that the documents are not accepted for the truth of the statements contained in them, but for the fact that certain representations were made in the documents.

All motions not previously ruled on or addressed in this decision are deemed denied.