Pacific Gas & Electric Company v. Federal Energy Regulatory Commission

In this case, we consider another piece of the California energy crisis puzzle. 1 Before us are petitions for review from the California Independent System Operator (“Cal-ISO”) and Pacific Gas and Electric Company (“PG & E”), alleging that the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (“FERC”) committed various errors in permitting Cal-ISO to re-run certain Settlement Statements. We dismiss the petitions for lack of subject matter jurisdiction. We conclude that we lack subject matter jurisdiction to consider Cal-ISO’s petition for review because it implicates FERC’s prosecutorial discretion. We conclude that we lack subject matter jurisdiction to entertain PG & E’s petition for review because it is an impermissible collateral attack on a prior FERC order.

I

These are two more cases in a series of cases concerning California’s energy crisis, which occurred from 1998-2002. We have provided a history of the crisis in other opinions, see e.g., PUC-FERC, 456 F.3d at 1033-1044, so it is unnecessary for us to detail it here except as necessary to explain our reasoning. See also Cal. ex rel. Lockyer v. FERC, 383 F.3d 1006, 1008-11 *864 (9th Cir.2004) (summarizing the history of the…