Public utility; include Hinshaw natural gas pipeline systems in the definition of.

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To: Public Utilities
MISSISSIPPI LEGISLATURE REGULAR SESSION 2026

By: Representative Powell

COMMITTEE SUBSTITUTE
FOR
HOUSE BILL NO. 1566

AN ACT TO AMEND SECTION 77-3-3, MISSISSIPPI CODE OF 1972, TO 1
PROVIDE THAT ALL HINSHAW NATURAL GAS PIPELINES SHALL BE SUBJECT TO 2
THE REGULATION AND JURISDICTION OF THE PUBLIC SERVICE COMMISSION 3
WITH REGARD TO RATES, SERVICES AND FACILITIES; TO DEFINE THE TERM 4
"HINSHAW NATURAL GAS PIPELINE"; TO AMEND SECTION 77-3-11, 5
MISSISSIPPI CODE OF 1972, TO PROVIDE THAT ALL HINSHAW NATURAL GAS 6
PIPELINES MUST SEEK AUTHORIZATION FROM THE COMMISSION PRIOR TO THE 7
CONSTRUCTION, ACQUISITION, EXTENSION, AND OPERATION OF PIPELINE 8
SYSTEMS; TO PROVIDE THAT PIPELINES ARE NOT REQUIRED TO SEEK 9
AUTHORITY RELATED TO CERTAIN MINOR CONSTRUCTION ACTIVITIES; TO 10
REQUIRE THAT ALL JURISDICTIONAL CONTRACTS BETWEEN THE HINSHAW 11
PIPELINE AND ANY THIRD PARTY BE FILED WITH THE COMMISSION; AND FOR 12
RELATED PURPOSES. 13
BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF MISSISSIPPI: 14
SECTION 1. Section 77-3-3, Mississippi Code of 1972, is 15
amended as follows: 16
77-3-3. As used in this chapter: 17
(a) The term "corporation" includes a private or public 18
corporation, a municipality, an association, a joint-stock 19
association or a business trust. 20
(b) The term "person" includes a natural person, a 21
partnership of two (2) or more persons having a joint or common 22
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interest, a cooperative, nonprofit, limited dividend or mutual 23
association, a corporation, or any other legal entity. 24
(c) The term "municipality" includes any incorporated 25
city, town or village. 26
(d) The term "public utility" includes persons and 27
corporations, or their lessees, trustees and receivers now or 28
hereafter owning or operating in this state equipment or 29
facilities for: 30
(i) The generation, manufacture, transmission, 31
distribution, provision, or furnishing of electricity to or for 32
the public, whether an individual person or an entity or a 33
collection of persons or entities, for compensation; 34
(ii) The transmission, sale, sale for resale, or 35
distribution of natural, artificial, or mixed natural and 36
artificial gas to the public for compensation by means of 37
transportation, transmission, or distribution facilities and 38
equipment located within this state; however, the term shall not 39
include the production and gathering of natural gas, the sale of 40
natural gas in or within the vicinity of the field where produced, 41
or the distribution or sale of liquefied petroleum gas or the sale 42
to the ultimate consumer of natural gas for use as a motor vehicle 43
fuel * * *. 44
All Hinshaw natural gas pipelines shall be subject to 45
the regulation and jurisdiction of the commission with regard to 46
rates, services and facilities. A "Hinshaw natural gas pipeline" 47
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means a pipeline that is physically located within the State of 48
Mississippi, engaged in interstate commerce, and providing natural 49
gas for consumption within the State of Mississippi and through 50
the regulatory jurisdiction exercised by the State of Mississippi, 51
and it is exempt from the Natural Gas Act of 1938 ("NGA") pursuant 52
to Section 1(c) of the NGA; 53
(iii) The transmission, conveyance or reception of 54
any message over wire, of writing, signs, signals, pictures and 55
sounds of all kinds by or for the public, where such service is 56
offered to the public for compensation, and the furnishing, or the 57
furnishing and maintenance, of equipment or facilities to the 58
public, for compensation, for use as a private communications 59
system or part thereof; however, no person or corporation not 60
otherwise a public utility within the meaning of this chapter 61
shall be deemed such solely because of engaging in this state in 62
the furnishing, for private use as last aforementioned, and 63
moreover, nothing in this chapter shall be construed to apply to 64
television stations, radio stations, community television antenna 65
services, video services, Voice over Internet Protocol services 66
("VoIP"), any wireless services, including commercial mobile 67
services, Internet Protocol ("IP") - enabled services or broadband 68
services; and 69
(iv) The transmission, distribution, sale or 70
resale of water to the public for compensation, or the collection, 71
transmission, treatment or disposal of sewage, or otherwise 72
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operating a sewage disposal service, to or for the public for 73
compensation. 74
The term "public utility" shall not include any person not 75
otherwise a public utility, who provides or furnishes the services 76
or commodity described in this paragraph only to himself, his 77
employees or tenants as an incident of such employee service or 78
tenancy, if such services are not sold or resold to such tenants 79
or employees on a metered or consumption basis other than the 80
submetering authorized under Section 77-3-97. 81
The term "public utility" shall not include any person not 82
otherwise a public utility, who purchases electricity on a metered 83
retail basis from the electric public utility that holds a 84
certificate of public convenience and necessity for the area in 85
which the person is located, and provides or furnishes a portion 86
of that electricity, but not electricity from any other source, to 87
the public for compensation directly and exclusively to charge 88
battery-powered electric vehicles and plug-in hybrid electric 89
vehicles. Any such person described in this paragraph is an 90
end-use customer, whether or not such person receives compensation 91
for battery or vehicle charging. 92
A public utility's business other than of the character 93
defined in subparagraphs (i) through (iv) of this paragraph is not 94
subject to the provisions of this chapter. 95
(e) The term "rate" means and includes every 96
compensation, charge, fare, toll, customer deposit, rental and 97
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classification, or the formula or method by which such may be 98
determined, or any of them, demanded, observed, charged or 99
collected by any public utility for any service, product or 100
commodity described in this section, offered by it to the public, 101
and any rules, regulations, practices or contracts relating to any 102
such compensation, charge, fare, toll, rental or classification; 103
however, the term "rate" shall not include charges for electrical 104
current furnished, delivered or sold by one (1) public utility to 105
another for resale. 106
(f) The word "commission" shall refer to the Public 107
Service Commission of the State of Mississippi, as now existing, 108
unless otherwise indicated. 109
(g) The term "affiliated interest" or "affiliate" 110
includes: 111
(i) Any person or corporation owning or holding, 112
directly or indirectly, twenty-five percent (25%) or more of the 113
voting securities of a public utility; 114
(ii) Any person or corporation in any chain of 115
successive ownership of twenty-five percent (25%) or more of the 116
voting securities of a public utility; 117
(iii) Any corporation of which fifteen percent 118
(15%) or more of the voting securities is owned or controlled, 119
directly or indirectly, by a public utility; 120
(iv) Any corporation of which twenty-five percent 121
(25%) or more of the voting securities is owned or controlled, 122
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directly or indirectly, by any person or corporation that owns or 123
controls, directly or indirectly, twenty-five percent (25%) or 124
more of the voting securities of any public utility or by any 125
person or corporation in any chain of successive ownership of 126
twenty-five percent (25%) of such securities; 127
(v) Any person who is an officer or director of a 128
public utility or of any corporation in any chain of successive 129
ownership of fifteen percent (15%) or more of voting securities of 130
a public utility; or 131
(vi) Any person or corporation that the 132
commission, after notice and hearing, determines actually 133
exercises any substantial influence or control over the policies 134
and actions of a public utility, or over which a public utility 135
exercises such control, or that is under a common control with a 136
public utility, such control being the possession, directly or 137
indirectly, of the power to direct or cause the discretion of the 138
management and policies of another, whether such power is 139
established through ownership of voting securities or by any other 140
direct or indirect means. 141
However, the term "affiliated interest" or "affiliate" shall 142
not include a joint agency organized pursuant to Section 77-5-701 143
et seq., nor a member municipality thereof. 144
(h) The term "facilities" includes all the plant and 145
equipment of a public utility, used or useful in furnishing public 146
utility service, including all real and personal property without 147
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limitation, and any and all means and instrumentalities in any 148
manner owned, operated, leased, licensed, used, controlled, 149
furnished or supplied for, by or in connection with its public 150
utility business. 151
(i) The term "cost of service" includes operating 152
expenses, taxes, depreciation, net revenue and operating revenue 153
requirement at a claimed rate of return from public utility 154
operations. 155
(j) The term "lead-lag study" includes an analysis to 156
determine the amount of capital which investors in a public 157
utility, the rates of which are subject to regulation under the 158
provisions of this chapter, must provide to meet the day-to-day 159
operating costs of the public utility prior to the time such costs 160
are recovered from customers, and the measurement of (i) the lag 161
in collecting from the customer the cost of providing service, and 162
(ii) the lag in paying the cost of providing service by the public 163
utility. 164
(k) The term "broadband services" means any service 165
that consists of or includes a high-speed access capability to 166
transmit at a rate that is not less than two hundred (200) 167
kilobits per second either in the upstream or downstream direction 168
and either: 169
(i) Is used to provide access to the Internet, or 170
(ii) Provides computer processing, information 171
storage, information content or protocol conversion, including any 172
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service applications or information service provided over such 173
high-speed access service. 174
(l) The term "video services" means video programming 175
services without regard to delivery technology, including Internet 176
Protocol technology ("Internet Protocol television or IPTV") and 177
video programming provided as a part of a service that enables 178
users to access content, information, email or other services 179
offered over the public Internet. The term "video programming" 180
means any programming as defined in 47 USCS Section 522(20). 181
(m) The term "Voice over Internet Protocol services" or 182
"VoIP services" means any service that: (i) enables real-time, 183
two-way voice communications that originate from or terminate to 184
the user's location in Internet Protocol or any successor 185
protocol; (ii) uses a broadband connection from the user's 186
location; and (iii) permits users generally to receive calls that 187
originate on the Public Switched Telephone Network and to 188
terminate calls to the Public Switched Telephone Network. 189
(n) The term "commercial mobile services" means any 190
services as defined in 47 USCS Section 332(d). 191
(o) The term "Internet Protocol-enabled services" or 192
"IP-enabled services" means any service, capability, 193
functionality, or application provided using Internet Protocol, or 194
any successor protocol, that enables an end user to send or 195
receive a communication in Internet Protocol format, or any 196
successor format, regardless of whether the communications is 197
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voice, data or video. Nothing contained in this paragraph shall 198
apply to retail services that are tariffed by the commission. 199
(p) "Broadband service provider" means an entity that 200
provides broadband services to others on a wholesale basis or to 201
end-use customers on a retail basis. 202
(q) "Broadband operator" means a broadband service 203
provider that uses the electric delivery system of any public 204
utility of the type as defined in paragraph (d)(i) of this section 205
with the public utility's consent to provide broadband services. 206
(r) "Electric delivery system" means the poles, lines, 207
fiber, cables, broadband system, materials, equipment, easements 208
and other facilities or properties used by any public utility of 209
the type as defined in paragraph (d)(i) of this section to deliver 210
or facilitate the delivery, sale or use of electric energy. 211
(s) "Eligible municipality" means any municipality with 212
a population of greater than One Hundred Thousand (100,000) 213
according to the latest decennial census which has been the 214
subject of litigation by the United States Environmental 215
Protection Agency for violations of the Safe Drinking Water Act, 216
42 USC Section 300(f) et seq. 217
(t) "Eligible homeowners association" means any 218
homeowners association created and governed by restrictive 219
covenants, if the subdivision subject to these covenants: 220
(i) Was constructed prior to 1970 outside of 221
municipal boundaries; 222
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(ii) Was subsequently annexed by an eligible 223
municipality, irrespective of whether the municipality was an 224
eligible municipality at the time of annexation or subsequently 225
became eligible; and 226
(iii) Is adjacent to which a ground water well 227
system originally designed to supply the subdivision which 228
continues to provide drinking water to a private user is located. 229
SECTION 2. Section 77-3-11, Mississippi Code of 1972, is 230
amended as follows: 231
77-3-11. (1) No person shall construct, acquire, extend or 232
operate equipment for manufacture, mixing, generating, 233
transmitting or distributing natural or manufactured gas, or mixed 234
gas, or water, for any intrastate sale to or for the public for 235
compensation, or for the operation of a public utility operating a 236
business and equipment or facilities as contemplated by * * * 237
Section 77-3-3(d)(iii), without first having obtained from the 238
commission a certificate that the present or future public 239
convenience and necessity require or will require the operation of 240
such equipment or facility. 241
(2) All Hinshaw natural gas pipelines must seek 242
authorization prior to the construction, acquisition, extension, 243
and/or operation of pipeline systems. Approvals from the 244
commission shall certify its approval and state its 245
acknowledgement of its jurisdiction over such facilities, rates 246
and services. 247
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(a) Such certification shall deem the authorized 248
activity, including all associated facilities, rates, and 249
services, as just and reasonable and in the public convenience and 250
necessity carrying all such associated authority and rights, 251
including, but not limited to, eminent domain rights. 252
(b) Pipelines shall not be required to seek authority 253
related to minor construction activities, including, but not 254
limited to, new interconnects, and/or maintenance activities 255
related to existing pipeline facilities. 256
(c) All jurisdictional contracts between the Hinshaw 257
pipeline and any third party executed shall be filed with the 258
commission. Upon filing, the commission may, within thirty (30) 259
days, approve the contract with a finding that it is just and 260
reasonable, and in the public interest, or order further review of 261
the contract prior to approval. Such review by the commission may 262
include analysis-type mechanisms including, but not limited to, 263
cost of service. If the commission has not ordered further review 264
of the contract within thirty (30) days from the date of filing, 265
the contract shall be automatically approved. 266
(3) No person shall construct, acquire, extend or operate 267
equipment for manufacture, generating, transmitting or 268
distributing electricity for any intrastate or interstate sale to 269
or for the public for compensation without first having obtained 270
from the commission a certificate that the present and future 271
public convenience and necessity require or will require the 272
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operation of such equipment or facility. Provided, however, 273
nothing herein contained shall be construed to require a joint 274
municipal electric power agency organized in accordance with the 275
provisions of Section 77-5-201 et seq., Mississippi Code of 1972, 276
to obtain any permit, license, certificate or approval from the 277
Mississippi Public Service Commission. 278
( * * *4) No person shall construct, acquire, extend or 279
operate equipment or facilities for collecting, transmitting, 280
treating or disposing of sewage, or otherwise operating an 281
intrastate sewage disposal service, to or for the public for 282
compensation, without first having obtained from the commission a 283
certificate that the present or future public convenience and 284
necessity require or will require the operation of such equipment 285
or facilities. 286
( * * *5) However, nothing herein shall be construed to 287
require any certificate of convenience and necessity from the 288
commission for the production and gathering of natural gas, the 289
sale of natural gas in or within the vicinity of the field where 290
produced, the distribution or sale of liquefied petroleum gas, the 291
sale of natural gas to the ultimate consumer for use as a motor 292
vehicle fuel, or for the facilities and equipment utilized in any 293
such operations. 294
( * * *6) Upon complaints filed by not less than ten percent 295
(10%) of the total subscribers or three thousand five hundred 296
(3,500) subscribers of a public utility, whichever is less, then 297
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ST: Public utility; include Hinshaw natural gas
pipeline systems in the definition of.
the commission shall hold a hearing on the adequacy of service as 298
contemplated in Section 77-3-21. 299
( * * *7) With respect to any facility or contract for a 300
facility serving a customer under Section 77-3-271, nothing in 301
this section shall supersede the provisions of Section 77-3-271. 302
SECTION 3. This act shall take effect and be in force from 303
and after July 1, 2026, and shall stand repealed on June 30, 2026. 304