“The recent rate case was a large and complicated filing. We believe the IPUC erred in some areas when making its decision,” said Idaho Power Vice President for Regulatory Affairs Ric Gale. “Those areas include how the company’s income taxes are computed for ratemaking purposes, issues surrounding the payment of legal fees, and some computational errors in the determination of the Idaho revenue requirement.”

The income tax issue represents the largest segment of the petition and if granted would provide the company an additional $11.5 million increase. Gale said the IPUC abandoned standard tax rate setting practices and used a five-year historical average methodology.

“This in essence is retroactive ratemaking,” he said. “In previous cases, the commission and the State Supreme Court both have found this to be unacceptable,” he said.

Gale also said the IPUC disallowed legal expenses that prudently occurred during the 2003 test year. Those expenses, he said were the result of the company attempting to ensure that its customers would not be precluded from sharing in refunds that might have resulted from two Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) refund cases associated with the western energy crisis of 2000-2001.

The petition also noted that the order contained some computational errors that when corrected result in the need for a $2.7 million upward adjustment in the company’s Idaho revenue requirement.

The IPUC has 28 days to respond to the company’s petition.

Use the links below to view Case No. IPC-E-03-13: Petition for Reconsideration of Order No. 29505. The files are in Adobe Acrobat Reader format (PDF).

Petition for Reconsideration(267.0Kb)
Attachment 1(4.1m)
Attachment 2(131.5Kb)