Page:Department of Public Utilities v. Arkansas Louisiana Gas Co.pdf/5

as a customer. These consist of 318 rural consumers, 54 of reSpondent's city distribution plants, and the pipe line customers consisting of 40 industrial consumers, 2 city distribution plants owned by corporations affiliated with the respondent and one independently owned city plant.

"Line A has 141 taps in Arkansas between the state line and Little Rock, Line H has 117 taps, Line K has 99 taps, and Line E has 23 taps. While it is true that not all of these taps were in use at the time of the hearing, they all have been used at some time or they would never have been made. At the time of the hearing approximately 100 of them were not in use or not assigned directly to consumers.

"In the operation of the system respondent employs what is known as a gas dispatcher who, by reason of experience and consultation of weather reports and other available data, is able to estimate with reasonable accuracy the demands for gas, of not only the system in Arkansas, but in Louisiana arid Texas, and accordingly directs the movement of gas in or into the three states. At the time of dispatching the gas he, nor any one else, knows what the demand of any particular customer is, or will be, and he only undertakes to supply sufficient gas to meet the entire system demand.

"The gas supplied to each pipe line customer is supplied under a contract signed by respondent at its general office at Shreveport in the state of Louisiana. To an extent not disclosed by the record, each of these contracts provides for a minimum charge, or a charge for readiness to serve, without regard to the quantity of gas consumed. While these contracts may vary as to the charges for gas and in other immaterial respects, they all provide that the title to the gas passes to the customer at the ontlet side of the meter installed upon his premises, and do not require the customer to take any specific quantity of gas within any given time. He is merely required to take gas in sufficient quantities to supply the individual requirements of his distribution plant or industrial plant, as the case may be. If any