STATE OF CALIFORNIA GRAY DAVIS, Governor

PUBLIC UTILITIES COMMISSION

505 VAN NESS AVENUE

SAN FRANCISCO, CA 94102-3298

April 23, 2001

TO: PARTIES OF RECORD IN RULEMAKING (R.) 88-08-018 AND R.90-02-008

This is the draft decision of Administrative Law Judge (ALJ) Wong. It will be on the Commission's agenda at the next regular meeting 30 days after the above date. The Commission may act then, or it may postpone action until later.

When the Commission acts on the draft decision, it may adopt all or part of it as written, amend or modify it, or set it aside and prepare its own decision. Only when the Commission acts does the decision become binding on the parties.

Parties to the proceeding may file comments on the draft decision as provided in Article 19, attached, of the Commission's "Rules of Practice and Procedure." Pursuant to Rule 77.3 opening comments shall not exceed 15 pages. Finally, comments must be served separately on the ALJ and the assigned Commissioner, and for that purpose I suggest hand delivery, overnight mail, or other expeditious method of service.

/s/ LYNN T. CAREW by KH

Lynn T. Carew, Chief

Administrative Law Judge

LTC:eap

Attachments

ALJ/JSW/eap DRAFT CA-11

5/24/2001

Decision DRAFT DECISION OF ALJ WONG (Mailed 4/23/2001)

BEFORE THE PUBLIC UTILITIES COMMISSION OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA

Order Instituting Rulemaking into natural gas procurement and reliability issues.	Rulemaking 88-08-018 (Filed August 10, 1988)
Order Instituting Rulemaking on the Commission's own motion to change the structure of gas utilities' procurement practices and to propose refinements to the regulatory framework for gas utilities.	Rulemaking 90-02-008 (Filed February 2, 1990)

OPINION REGARDING THE SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
GENERATION COALITION EMERGENCY PETITION FOR
MODIFICATION OF DECISIONS 90-09-089 AND 97-11-070

I. Summary

On February 15, 2001, the Southern California Generation Coalition (SCGC) filed an emergency petition to modify Decision (D.) 90-09-089 and D.97-11-070.¹ SCGC's petition requests that the two decisions be modified to waive the 10 percent limit on monthly positive imbalances (overnominations) for noncore customers during the winter balancing period, and that noncore customers be permitted to combat gas price spikes by using their previous months' accumulated positive imbalance volumes to meet at least a portion of the flowing supply requirement that applies when the Southern California Gas Company (SoCalGas) implements its winter daily balancing rules.

Based on the reasons contained in this decision, SCGC's request to modify the two decisions is denied.