Winter Storm Uri The fallout from the Texas Freeze in February 2021 continues. A year later, UT’s Austin Energy Institute concluded that multiple failures of power plants, gas processing plants, gas storage and distribution facilities, and gas production all contributed to the system failures. ERCOT management was fired; natural gas…
“Account of a Visit from St. Nicholas”, as the poem was first called, was first published anonymously in New York’s Troy Sentinel newspaper on December 23, 1823. An college classmate from Troy, Jack Casey, recently told me of two trials in Troy over the authorship of the poem – the…
Last week the Corpus Christi Court of Appeals issued a decision on a long-running dispute over reservation of a royalty interest in a deed. This is the court’s second opinion in the case. In the court’s first opinion in 2018, the court construed the following royalty reservation: SAVE AND EXCEPT…
Mayfield and Ingham leased several sections in Sutton County to EnerVest. EnerVest produces gas which goes to a gas plant for processing and pays royalty on the residue gas and natural gas liquids, after deducting post-production costs. The gas must be compressed and dehydrated before sale, and EnerVest does not…
A good article in Texas Tribune about the growing problem of P-13 wells that are leaking and contaminating land and groundwater. When an oil and gas operator drills a dry hole or decides to abandon a well, instead of plugging the well it can transfer the well to the surface…
Last June the Corpus Christi Court of Appeals decided that the right to store oil in a salt cavern belongs to the surface owner. In Myers-Woodward, LLC v. Underground Services Markham, LLC, et al., No. 13-20-00172-CV, the court addressed a dispute between Myers-Woodward, which owned the surface estate and a…
7th Annual GDHM Land & Mineral Owner Seminar – November 18 Our firm is hosting its 7th annual seminar for Texas land and mineral owners on topics of interest in oil, gas, and energy law, including: Legislative session forecast Negotiating solar leases Allocation well litigation update Carbon sequestration leases Market…
Ridgefield Permian v. Diamondback is another case arising out of the same tax foreclosure suit that was addressed in Mitchell v. MAP Resources, decided earlier this year by the Texas Supreme Court. My discussion of Mitchell can be found here. Both Ridgefield and Mitchell were initially decided by the El…
Last year KUT produced a podcast, “The Disconnect,” chronicling the February 2021 Texas freeze and blackout. KUT has now produced Part 2: “The Disconnect: Power, Politics and the Texas Blackout,” explaining what has happened since–what has been fixed, the cost in electric bills, and the aftermath–hosted by KUT reporter Mose…
Sometimes lawyers really do have the best responses. The following is just one example. Rebuilding New Orleans after Katrina often caused residents to be challenged to prove home titles back hundreds of years. That is because of community history stretching back over two centuries during which houses were passed along through generations…