My partner Nicholas Miller recently appeared on Tiffany Dowell’s podcast “Ag Law in the Field,” one of the programs offered by Texas A&M Agrilife Extension Service. A great discussion on how to approach negotiating an oil and gas lease. You can listen to it here. Check out Tiffany’s other podcasts…
The Texas Supreme Court denied the landowners’ motion for rehearing last Friday in Murphy v. Adams, rejecting their claim that Murphy Exploration had breached their oil and gas lease by failing to drill an offset well or pay liquidated damages. The Court was divided 5-4 on the issue when it…
Peter Huddleston, President of Huddleston & Co. and a prominent petroleum engineer and a friend, agreed to report on the status of shale plays in Texas at our firm’s land and mineral owner seminar on November 9. He kindly agreed to let me use some of his slides. You can…
My blog has been nominated in The Expert Institute’s 2018 Best Legal Blog Contest! I’m in the category “Niche & Specialty.” And I have one vote already! So vote early and often.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit recently handed down its opinion in Seeligson v. Devon Energy Production Co., Cause No. 17-10320. The case is an appeal from a decision in the District Court for the Northern District of Texas certifying a class of royalty owners to sue…
Dr. Scott Tinker, the Director of the Bureau of Economic Geology, University of Texas, and the Texas’ State Geologist, produced and starred in a film a couple of years ago called Switch. It provides an overview of how we use energy in the world and the opportunities and challenges facing…
Five years ago I wrote a blog entry titled “The Limits of Rational Decision-making.” The topic was a sociological study testing subjects’ ability to make decisions based on facts. The conclusion of the study was that knowledge does not increase a person’s ability to reason when it comes to politically…
The Texas Supreme Court recently refused to consider the case of Devon Energy Production Company v. Apache Corporation, decided by the Eastland Court of Appeals – 550 S.W.3d 259. The case presents issues that, remarkably, have not previously been considered by a Texas appellate court. Norma Jean Hester leased her…
The Texas Tribune is joining with the Center for Public Integrity to publish a series of articles on the Permian Basin. Called “Blowout,” it is the result of eight months of study of the impact of the Permian oil boom. The first article can be found here. The International Energy…
Two cases were argued in the Texas Supreme Court last week that bear watching, and a third interesting case is pending in the court on petition for review. No. 17-0266, Burlington v. Texas Crude Texas Crude and Burlington entered into a joint development agreement covering leases Texas Crude had acquired…