Colleen Schreiber has written an excellent article in the June 13 edition of Livestock Weekly, “Landowners Hold Off Oil and Gas Lobby on Common Carrier Bills,” describing the blow-by-blow negotiations and lobbying in the pipeline industry’s efforts to “solve” the problems created by the Texas Supreme Court’s decision in Tex.…
The examiners who heard the Klotzmans’ protest of EOG Resources’ application for an allocation well permit have issued their Proposal for Decision in the case. A copy of the PFD can be viewed here: 2013-06-25 PFD EOG Klotzman (2).pdf Our firm represents the protestants in the case. For my prior…
Last Friday, the Texas Supreme Court affirmed judgment in favor of XTO in its battle with Homer Merriman over whether XTO’s well should have been moved so as to accommodate his cattle-working operation. I wrote about this case when the Supreme Court decided to hear it. Mr. Merriman owns 40 acres…
Terrence Henry, a writer for StateImpact Texas, has written a recent article, “Why Oil and Gas Lobbyists Were Big Spenders in Texas.” He analyzes two reports on spending on lobbyists and campaigns compiled by Texans for Public Justice. Lobbyists for energy and natural resources companies spent between $31.4 million and $62.5…
A friend recently made me aware of a publication by the Real Estate Center at Texas A&M called “Mineral Law West of the Pecos,” written by Judon Fambrough, a lawyer who is with the Center. Judon has written much good stuff about land and mineral law in Texas, and this…
The session is over, and the Texas legislature has failed once again to pass sunset legislation for the Texas Railroad Commission. The legislature instead authorized continuation of the RRC for another four years, with sunset review to be repeated in the 2017 legislative session. Under Texas sunset act, every state…
A recent article in the New York Times highlights the difference between “oil,” or “owal” as we say in Texas, and the heavy crude oil mined from Canadian tar sands. A major waste product of that mining is coke. The tarry substance mined in Canada goes through an initial refining process to…
The Texas Supreme Court has recently refused to hear Friddle v. Fisher, 378 S.W.3d 475 (Tex.App.-Texarkana 2012). The court of appeals’ opinion has an interesting discussion of the duties of a mineral owner to owners of non-participating royalty interests burdening the mineral estate and of the application of the discovery…
A study written by J. David Hughes and published in February by the Post Carbon Institute claims that shale gas reserves are vastly overstated. “Drill Baby Drill – Can Unconventional Fuels Usher In a New Era of Energy Abundance?” A companion article by Deborah Rogers claims that the shale “frenzy” is…
The pipeline industry bill intended to “fix” the issues raised by Texas Rice Land Partners v. Denbury Pipeline, appears to be dead in the Texas legislature. The issue: requiring pipelines that assert the power of eminent domain to prove that they qualify as common carriers. The Texas Supreme Court held…