California Electric Power Co. v. Federal Power Commission

California Electric Power Company petitions for review of an order of the Federal Power Commission directing it to cease and desist from charging two Nevada customers (the Department of the Navy and Mineral County, Nevada) any rate other than “filed rates” for electric energy it sells those customers.

The Commission’s order does not assume to perpetuate the “filed rates,” but provides only that they shall control until and unless superseded by new rates filed by the Company or by rates fixed by the Commission, Aside from some minor, and, we think, inconsequential, objections of a procedural nature, the issue posed by the petition is whether the rates are subject to the Commission’s filing requirements, or whether, as the petitioner contends, the Public Utilities Commission of California, either alone or in conjunction with the Public Service Commission of Nevada, has jurisdiction over the rates charged these customers.

Petitioner owns and operates an interconnected system for the generation and distribution of electric power in California and Nevada. The power sold to the Navy and to Mineral County is generated in and transmitted from petitioner’s Northern Division plants in…