There is new reason to be energized (excuse the pun!) about Texas’ oil and gas industry in 2013. The last several years have been exciting in this field, and Texas has benefited from its substantial natural resources. Now recent reports indicate that oil and gas companies will spend $28 billion…
A few months ago, the nonprofit organization Resources for the Future sponsored a seminar entitled “The Future of Fuel: Toward the Next Decade of US Energy Policy.” The seminar highlighted the future of five key fuels over the next decade–oil, coal, natural gas, renewables, and nuclear–as well as the future…
The rights of Texas mineral owners can be complicated, which is why having a Texas oil and gas attorney review your options is important before you sell or lease your mineral rights or before you buy property in which you will own only the surface. In many cases, a property…
My readers know that I am generally supportive of oil and gas companies, although in my practice, I represent only Texas land, mineral and royalty owners. Smart development of Texas mineral resources has significant benefits for Texans and the country through cheaper fuel, energy independence, and economic growth. But this…
Congress is considering whether to eliminate or limit a federal tax deduction for intangible drilling costs. Intangible drilling costs are those costs incurred to develop an oil or gas well other than the costs of the actual well. It includes costs such as surveying, clearing the land for a well…
During all of the budget talks in Washington, DC, I was interested to read a recent report entitled “CO2 Enhanced Oil Recovery” by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce regarding how enhanced oil recovery (“EOR”) techniques could add significant revenue to the Texas and federal budget, as well as enhance our…
In what may be unsettling news for Houston, Devon Energy Corporation is closing its Houston, Texas office and shifting operations to Oklahoma City, where it has its corporate headquarters. The Houston office has been in charge of operations in Texas, Louisiana, Ohio and Michigan. There were an estimated 500 employees…
Recently, NuStar Energy LP announced that they are proposing a new system of oil pipelines to bring oil from the Niobrara Shale in Colorado to Texas’s oil refineries. The Niobrara Shale is a promising play and there is a need to get the oil produced there to refineries that can…
The United States, including Texas, will be self-sufficient in natural gas within the next ten years, according to a recent survey of oil and gas professionals. The survey, entitled Energy Independence and Security: A Reality Check was published by the Deloitte University Press. There is less optimism about self sufficiency…
Ever since Gasland came out and hydraulic fracturing became a hot topic that everyone, even people with no knowledge of the field, had an opinion about, the federal government has sought to use the issue for political gain. When people in Pavillion, Wyoming, complained about their drinking water and claimed…