noting that courts “grant[] considerable deference to the expertise of a regulatory commission in arriving at a proper ratemaking judgment”
How later courts described this case
- noting that courts “grant[] considerable deference to the expertise of a regulatory commission in arriving at a proper ratemaking judgment”
- "[A]bsent precise explanation of methodology as applied to the facts of the case, there is no way for a court to tell whether the Commission, however expert, has been arbitrary or unreasonable"
- the Commission must explain its actions “clearly"
- “ratepayers, who have been charged for depreciation of plant facilities, should be repaid with the gains, if any, upon eventual sale of those facilities”
Written by the judges who cited it.
The opinion
NEBEKER, Associate Judge:
It has been and remains my intention to dissent from the majority’s disposition of this case, principally because of my conviction that the majority sorely misconceives our proper review role in cases of this nature.
The question of the scope of our review is among the issues which now are pending before the court en banc in Potomac Electric Power Co. v. Public Service Commission, No. 10490, D.C.App., 380 A.2d 126 . It is my belief that we should not dispose of this case until the en banc case has been resolved. The majority, nonetheless, has elected to publish its opinion before the preparation of my dissent. It does so under Part VII, Paragraph G, of our new Internal Operating Procedures (from the adoption of which I dissent).
I shall write and release my dissent in this case as soon as feasible after the court’s resolution of the en banc proceeding in No. 10490.