Supreme Court of Texas Washes Out the “Anadarko Washout”
If your co-tenant drills the well… does your lease still live? The Texas Supreme Court just tackled a high-stakes question that’s shaken up oil and gas titles across the state.
Producer’s Edge
TEXAS OIL AND GAS LAW BULLETIN
If your co-tenant drills the well… does your lease still live? The Texas Supreme Court just tackled a high-stakes question that’s shaken up oil and gas titles across the state.
Who owns the void left behind after millions of tons of salt are mined - and can it be used for someone else’s storage business? The Texas Supreme Court just drew the line.
What happens when a court reads your contract literally for one issue but decides what 'makes sense' for another? A geophysicist just found out.
Lario Oil & Gas Co. v. Black Hawk Energy Services, Ltd. highlights the importance of carefully drafting jury instructions and questions.
When can a Texas court rule on New Mexico property disputes? The answer hinges on whether the property interest is 'central' or just 'incidental' to the real fight.
When your neighbor's wastewater tanks your oil wells, when exactly can you sue? A Texas court wrestles with a timing question reshaping industry battles.
To many oil and gas lawyers the COPAS accounting procedure is sometimes an afterthought. But, in the context of JOA disputes, whether or not directly involving accounting issues, the COPAS procedure can have a critical impacts.
What happens when language in the body of an assignment of oil and gas interests conflicts with descriptions in the exhibits? Can limitations in the exhibit, such as depth references, supersede the operative granting language in the body of an agreement?
Purchase and sale transactions often progress through several stages of instruments, like layers of an onion, before they reach the final definitive purchase agreement, and perhaps even more layers before they reach the final assignment and post-closing items.
A security interest, under Texas’ version of the Uniform Commercial Code (the “Texas UCC”), is an interest in personal property or fixtures which secures payment or performance of an obligation. Real property is not subject to the Texas UCC.
Following the Texas Supreme Court’s ruling in Van Dyke v. Navigator Group that courts interpreting “antiquated instruments” that use 1/8 within a double fraction must begin with the rebuttable presumption that 1/8 refers to the entire mineral estate, Texas courts have wrestled with its implications.
In this recent case (Patch Energy LLC v. Indio Minerals LLC, No. 11-22-00280-CV, 2024 WL 4845955 [Tex. App.—Eastland Nov. 21, 2024, no pet. h.]), competing mineral purchasers claimed superior title to a royalty interest in Midland County, Texas that had been reserved in a 1930 mineral conveyance.
Producer’s Edge, Volume 6, Issue 2, brings you regulatory developments, and industry trends tailored for the oil and gas sector.