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Royalties Mineral Rights Oil & Gas

Gray Reed

“Free of Cost” Royalty Includes Post-production Costs

Gray Reed on

Fasken Ranch Ltd et al v. Puig et al featured a reservation in the sale of a ranch of an undivided 1/16 non-participating royalty interest “free of cost forever.”  What does that mean? In particular, does it mean that the...more

Gray Reed

Louisiana Supreme Court Issues Major Post-Production Cost Opinion

Gray Reed on

In Self v. BPX Operating, a case with significant implications for Louisiana operators and royalty owners, the Supreme Court of Louisiana ruled that the doctrine of negotiorum gestio in La. Civil Code art. 2292 does not allow...more

Gray Reed

Floating Beats Fixed in Another Royalty Dispute

Gray Reed on

Recent Texas royalty cases seem to feature litigants on the fixed royalty side trying, more often than not in vain, to escape the clutches of Van Dyke v. Navigator and Hysaw v. Dawkins. See those decisions for the history of...more

Houston Harbaugh, P.C.

Who Owns the Produced Water From Oil & Gas Operations?

Houston Harbaugh, P.C. on

Although historically viewed as a waste, produced water that comes to the surface as part of the oil and gas production stream now potentially has value. Produced water can be recycled and reused as part of hydraulic...more

Gray Reed

“Floating” Beats “Fixed ” in Texas Royalty Reservation

Gray Reed on

If you are scoring at home, count Permico Royalties LLC v. Barron Properties, Ltd., as a win for “floating” in the fixed-or-floating royalty battles. Permico, successor to grantors in a 1937 Deed for a tract in Ward County,...more

Foley & Lardner LLP

Texas Supreme Court Decides What “One-Half of One-Eighth” Means in 1924 Oil and Gas Deed

Foley & Lardner LLP on

Simple math isn’t always simple. As the Texas Supreme Court recently put it, “[o]nly in a legal text could the formula ‘one-half of one-eighth’ mean anything other than one-sixteenth.” No. 21-0146, 2023 WL 2053175 (Tex....more

Houston Harbaugh, P.C.

Pennsylvania Superior Court Clarifies Nature of Oil and Gas Lease Under Pennsylvania Law

Let’s assume you own a 160-acre farm in Washington County. Your father purchased the farm in 1992 from a local farmer named Jones. (the “1992 Deed”). At the time your father purchased the farm, there was an oil and gas lease...more

Gray Reed

Will the Fixed or Floating Suits Ever End?

Gray Reed on

Rhetorical Question: When will Texas be done with fixed/floating royalty cases such as Johnson et al v. Clifton et al? Rhetorical Answer: When scriveners of deeds that are open to eight conceivably plausible meanings...more

Houston Harbaugh, P.C.

The Strip and Gore Doctrine - Who Really Owns The Oil and Gas Under Roads and Highways?

Houston Harbaugh, P.C. on

Let’s assume your grandfather owned 99 acres in Washington County. In 1955, he sells a small portion of the farm to the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania in order to facilitate the construction of new State Route 39. This acreage...more

Houston Harbaugh, P.C.

Texas Supreme Court Rules That 1924 Deed Conveyed One Half Of The Oil and Gas Estate

Houston Harbaugh, P.C. on

The calculation of production royalties and the deduction of post-production costs remains a controversial topic here in Pennsylvania. As we have written before, there is another frustrating and often confusing...more

Gray Reed

Another Double-Fraction Texas Deed Case

Gray Reed on

Davis v. COG Operating, LLC, in construing a Warranty Deed with a reservation of minerals, applied the estate-misconception doctrine and denied the presumed grant doctrine. At issue were three instruments...more

Gray Reed

Who Bears the Burden of a Newly Discovered Non-Participating Royalty Interest?

Gray Reed on

The question in Brooke-Willbanks v. Flatland Mineral Fund LP, et al was which party to a Texas mineral deed would bear the burden of two previously reserved nonparticipating royalty interests....more

Roetzel & Andress

One Less Way for Ohio Landowners to Challenge Royalty Severances

Roetzel & Andress on

On February 15, 2022, the Ohio Supreme Court issued a significant decision in Peppertree Farms, L.L.C. v. Thonen establishing that, unless expressly stated otherwise, an oil and gas royalty interest retained in a deed...more

Jones Day

Supreme Court of New South Wales Rules on Mineral Sales Royalties Default

Jones Day on

Default in paying monthly mineral sales royalties leads to an obligation to pay up front the present value of future royalties. A decision (Thalanga Copper Mines Pty Ltd v Cromarty Resources Pty Ltd [2021] NSWSC 640 (4 June...more

Gray Reed

Texas NPRI Burdened with Post-Production Costs

Gray Reed on

BlueStone Nat. Res. II, LLC v. Nettye Engler Energy, LP is another Texas case deciding whether language creating a nonparticipating royalty interest prohibited deduction of post-production costs. (Spoiler alert: it didn’t....more

Gray Reed

My Operator is Making Money … Part 2, The Operator’s Response

Gray Reed on

The threat: You, the operator, are operating unprofitable wells where monthly costs exceed or barely equal revenues, making money on the fixed COPAS overhead charges. Your non-operators are going into the economic hole and...more

Gray Reed

Mineral Royalties are Not “Personal Effects” in Texas

Gray Reed on

Confirming the obvious, in In re Etheridge a Texas court concluded that “personal effects,” in a last will and testament did not include mineral royalties. Let’s investigate how the case got this far....more

Gray Reed

Trespass But no Damages in a Texas Case

Gray Reed on

What does it take these days to get money from a Texas jury? Not much, it seems; in XTO v. Goodwin the trick was convincing a higher court that you should keep it....more

Gray Reed

Does Texas Have a New “Rule” in Conveyancing?

Gray Reed on

Subject-to, reservations-from, and exceptions-to problems have been lurking in the shadows of Texas jurisprudence for a while now, and the courts have been all over the map in recent holdings....more

King & Spalding

Mineral and Royalty Interest MLPs: An Alternative Exit For PE-Backed Mineral and Royalty Interest Cos.

King & Spalding on

Oil and gas exploration companies no longer have to go door-to-door, or ranch-to-ranch, to negotiate oil and gas leases with individual mineral interest owners. Over the last decade or more, pure-play mineral and royalty...more

BakerHostetler

Struggling to Produce: Heirs to Claimed Royalty Interest Acquired in Late 1800s in 9,200-acre Tract in Texas Fail to Pass...

BakerHostetler on

On Monday, Oct. 10, 2016, dozens of claimed heirs to a one-half mineral interest allegedly obtained in the late 1800s in a 9,200-acre tract of land in Brooks County, Texas, filed a Petition for Review with the Texas Supreme...more

Gray Reed

Title Suit Booted for Failure to Join Parties

Gray Reed on

Longoria v. ExxonMobil is like throwing a big party but failing to invite all the right guests. The Longorias – 59 of them – sued producer-defendants over ownership of 9,200 acres in Brooks County, Texas, acquired in the...more

Gray Reed

Another Chesapeake Post-Production Deduction Case

Gray Reed on

The result was like others we’ve seen. Lessors Win. These wells are in Johnson and Tarrant County, Texas. Lessee Chesapeake Exploration sells to affiliate Chesapeake Marketing through affiliate-operator Chesapeake Operating....more

Gray Reed

Faulty Property Description Haunts Louisiana Servitude

Gray Reed on

Halloween is approaching, so let’s talk poltergeists – troublesome spirits that haunt a specific location. Where do they come from? In Quality Environmental Processes, Inc. v I.P. Petroleum Company, Inc., it was from a faulty...more

BakerHostetler

New Mexico Supreme Court Undermines Validity Of Standard Royalty Agreements

BakerHostetler on

On September 15, 2014, the New Mexico Supreme Court entered a decision in First Baptist Church of Roswell v. Yates Petroleum Corp., a case that could call into question the validity of royalty agreements and division orders...more

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