Oil and Gas Lawyer Blog
From Texas Tribune:
A major metro paper endorses a third-party statewide candidate… The Houston Chronicle has endorsed Libertarian Mark Miller in the race to replace David Porter on the three-member Texas Railroad Commission.
“Our editorial board interviews scores of candidates for political office every election year, but seldom do we find ourselves wholeheartedly endorsing a nominee from the Libertarian Party,” the editorial board wrote Tuesday night. “Then again, seldom have we met a Libertarian candidate like Mark Miller.”
Miller, a petroleum engineer who now develops software for the industry, previously ran for commissioner in 2014, earning about 3 percent of the vote.
He followed that race by authoring a book about the Commission.
In this year’s race, Miller faces Republican Wayne Christian, Democrat Grady Yarbrough and Green Party candidate Martina Salinas.
I’ve met Dr. Miller. He is a petroleum engineer and a former member of the faculty at the University of Texas, and ran for RRC in 2014. I have read his book, Oil & Gas and the Texas Railroad Commission – Lessons for regulating a Free Society – a book all land and mineral owners (and all voters interested in casting a vote in the RRC race) should read. Clearly the most qualified candidate in the race. In addition to providing a basic primer on oil and gas production and the role of the Commission, Dr. Miller’s book is chock-full of good ideas. For example:
On common carrier pipelines and eminent domain:
- Transfer all pipeline regulation to the Texas Department of Transportation.
- Increase the minimum third-party production fraction to be carried by a pipeline before it can exercise eminent domain authority.
- Provide harsh penalties for wrongly claiming the right to exercise eminent domain.
- Encourage pipelines to use existing rights-of-way.
A good read.