Mealey's Fracking : Mealey's : Legal News & Analysis

Mealey's Fracking

September 06, 2024
Supreme Court Chief Justice Seeks EPA Response To Application To Stay Final Rule

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Chief Justice of the United States John G. Roberts Jr. has requested a response from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency related to an application from energy companies that seek an immediate stay of the EPA’s final rule for emissions guidelines related to the oil and gas sector.
September 06, 2024
Parties File Final Briefs On Standing In Dispute Over Federal Fracking Permits

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Multiple final briefs have been filed in the District of Columbia Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals separately by environmental groups, the U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI) and hydraulic fracturing proponents in the dispute over federal fracking permits in New Mexico’s Permian Basin and Wyoming’s Powder River Basin. In the briefs the parties continue their respective arguments for or against the issuance of permits, with the DOI insisting that the groups have not established injury or causation.
September 05, 2024
Judge Dismisses Breach Of Contract Case, Says Fracking Well Did Not Violate Lease

OKLAHOMA CITY — A federal judge in Oklahoma has dismissed with prejudice a case brought by a mineral owner who contended that a hydraulic fracturing operator “willfully and intentionally” breached the lease between the parties, ruling that the plaintiff did not plausibly allege that the drilling of a particular well, referred to as the Katie Well, was done in violation of the lease.
September 05, 2024
Mineral Rights Holders Say Bid To Dismiss Case Fails Because Trespass Is Continual

COLUMBUS, Ohio — Mineral rights holders filed a brief in Ohio federal court on Sept. 4, arguing that it should deny a motion to dismiss their claim against hydraulic fracturing operators related to a dispute over the boundaries of the shale formation from which the fracking companies are extracting natural gas using a procedure called horizontal drilling. The mineral rights owners contend that their complaint survives a motion to dismiss because they allege that the trespass at issue is continual.
September 04, 2024
Magistrate Denies Company’s Bid To Dismiss Fracking Royalty Dispute

HARRISBURG, Pa. — A federal magistrate judge in Pennsylvania on Sept. 3 denied a hydraulic fracturing operator’s motion to dismiss a breach of contract lawsuit brought by two couples who entered into agreements for the development of natural gas on their properties, ruling that at this juncture of the litigation, the magistrate could not say that the leases in question “are not ambiguous” and, therefore, the claims survive.
September 04, 2024
6th Circuit Mandate Finalizes Decision Denying Royalties To Fracking Operator

CINCINNATI — The Sixth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals on Sept. 3 issued the mandate for its split decision that held that a lower court correctly ruled that two hydraulic fracturing companies do not owe another fracking operator royalties because the plaintiff fracking operator that sued in an attempt to get those royalties actually had no interest in the oil and gas produced from the wells in question on grounds that the overriding royalty interests (ORRIs) the plaintiff fracking operator acquired pertain only to royalties from oil and gas produced by vertical shallow wells.
September 03, 2024
Tribes Say Federal Fracking Lease Claims Fail Because Record Is ‘Well-Supported’

ANCHORAGE, Alaska — Native American tribal parties, which are intervenor defendants in a dispute over the U.S. Department of the Interior’s (DOI) cancellation of federal leases for hydraulic fracturing, filed a joinder on Aug. 30 to a brief filed by the DOI in Alaska federal court arguing that the plaintiffs’ claims under the Administrative Procedure Act (APA) fail “in light of the [DOI’s] reasonable and well-supported record and rationale for lease cancellation.”
August 29, 2024
Group Says Fracking Railroad Ruling ‘Flies In The Face’ Of High Court Precedent

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The Association of American Railroads (AAR) filed an amicus curiae brief on Aug. 29 in support of parties that want the U.S. Supreme Court to reverse a lower court ruling that held that the Surface Transportation Board (STB) failed to adequately examine the risk of wildfires and the impact on groundwater posed by the construction of a proposed rail line in Utah that would carry products related to hydraulic fracturing to and from the shale formation in the Uinta Basin. The AAR says the lower court ruling “flies in the face” of Supreme Court precedent.
August 27, 2024
City Of Baltimore: Fracking Operators, Others Conspired To Inflate Oil Prices

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — The city of Baltimore has filed a putative class action against multiple hydraulic fracturing companies in New Mexico federal court arguing that they engaged in a conspiracy to restrict the production of crude oil, along with “Wall Street investors, the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), and certain non-OPEC member countries aligned with OPEC, called “OPEC+” in an effort to inflate the price of crude oil.
August 20, 2024
Study: Companies Use ‘Personal Strategies’ To Get Landowners To Allow Fracking

LAS VEGAS — A research study published Aug. 19 by the journal “Nature Energy” has found that landmen working for hydraulic fracturing companies “have important advantages in the form of persistent and personalized tactics” against landowners in Ohio to force the unitization of wells against the desires of landowners, and it found evidence that landmen engaged in legal compulsion when this persistence fails, which “suggests a considerable procedural inequity at the heart of the process.”
August 19, 2024
Man Files Putative Class Alleging Some Shale Oil Producers Fixed Gas Prices

SAN FRANCISCO — A man filed a putative class action on Aug. 16 against multiple hydraulic fracturing companies in California federal court contending that they engaged in a conspiracy “to coordinate, and ultimately constrain, domestic shale oil production, which has had the effect of fixing, raising, and maintaining the price of retail gasoline” in violation of the Sherman Act.
August 12, 2024
Briefly: Some Claims May Proceed In Securities Fraud Case About Pipeline

PHILADELPHIA — A federal judge in Pennsylvania has ruled in a long and winding securities fraud class action related to the construction of a hydraulic fracturing pipeline that only claims brought by shareholders that are based on corrective disclosures made by the pipeline company in August 2018 may proceed.
August 09, 2024
North Dakota Says It Owns Long-Disputed Mineral Rights In Missouri Riverbed

WASHINGTON, D.C. — North Dakota, which is an intervenor defendant in a mineral rights dispute between Native American tribes and the U.S. government, has filed an answer in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia asking it to declare that title to the disputed Missouri Riverbed and underlying mineral interests is quieted in favor of the state.
August 09, 2024
Plaintiffs Seek 10th Circuit Review Of Fracking Royalty Class Action Saga

DENVER — Plaintiffs in a royalty payment dispute on Aug. 8 appealed to the 10th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals a lower court ruling that denied their motion to remand the case to Colorado state court and granted a hydraulic fracturing company’s motion for judgment on the pleadings, as the third iteration of a long-running class action plods along.
August 08, 2024
Groups Insist Federal Fracking Permit Approval Causes Harm, Standing Established

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Environmental groups that challenge federal hydraulic fracturing permits issued by the U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI) pertaining to New Mexico’s Permian Basin and Wyoming’s Powder River Basin filed a reply brief on Aug. 7 in the District of Columbia Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals insisting that they have plausibly alleged standing because they have alleged sufficient facts that their members’ “aesthetic, recreational, spiritual, and professional interests in listed species, public lands, and a healthy environment are harmed” by the issuance of fracking permits.
August 07, 2024
Panel Affirms Dismissal Of Damages Case Related To Fracking Well Operation

BATON ROUGE, La. — A state appeals panel in Louisiana on Aug. 7 affirmed a lower court’s ruling which dismissed with prejudice a claim brought by an oil and gas production company against Halliburton Energy Services Inc. (HESI) seeking damages for injury to a well that the production company said was caused by a coring gun provided by HESI which had been used in well operations.
August 07, 2024
Fracking Advocates: Lease Cancellation ‘Inconsistent’ With Agency’s Regulations

ANCHORAGE, Alaska — An industrial development group that advocates for hydraulic fracturing has filed a reply brief in Alaska federal court contending that the U.S. Department of the Interior’s (DOI) cancellation of federal fracking leases was “inconsistent with fundamental and well-established principals of both common-law and statutory due process, and was inconsistent” with the DOI’s own regulations.
August 06, 2024
Panel Reverses, Remands Case Over Drilling Rights, Says Contract Is ‘Unambiguous’

WOODSFIELD, Ohio — An appellate panel in Ohio has reversed and remanded a mineral rights dispute, ruling that an assignment of interest dating to 2007 is “unambiguous” and limits the drilling rights in question to a maximum depth of 4,000 feet. The panel also concluded that a 21-year statute of limitations also applies to the case; therefore, the trial court erred when it ruled in favor of property owners who claimed ownership over the deep rights involved in a drilling contract.
August 06, 2024
Company: 10th Circuit Must Reverse Royalty Ruling, Contract ‘Wrongly Interpreted’

DENVER — An oil and gas company on Aug. 5 filed a reply brief in the 10th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals arguing that it should reverse a hydraulic fracturing royalty ruling because the lower court wrongly interpreted a 50% obligation portion of the future royalty calculation method in the fracking contract to mean that an energy company is limited in the royalties it pays to the oil and gas company.
August 06, 2024
4th Circuit Says It Lacks Jurisdiction In West Virginia Abandoned Wells Case

RICHMOND, Va. — A panel of the Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals on Aug. 5 ruled that it lacked jurisdiction to rule on an appeal brought by a hydraulic fracturing operator in a protracted dispute over abandoned wells because the order being appealed, which denied the operator summary judgment on its claim that the case should be dismissed because the plaintiffs failed to join necessary parties, was not final.
August 05, 2024
Fracking Plaintiffs Want Stay Lifted To Pursue New Trial In Royalty Dispute

COLUMBUS, Ohio — Plaintiffs in a hydraulic fracturing royalty dispute on Aug. 2 moved in Ohio federal court to lift a stay so post-trial proceedings can continue as they seek a new trial after a jury determined that the plaintiffs had not reserved their rights under the leases.
August 01, 2024
Fracking Operator Says Oil Company Damaged Its Well, Did Not Follow Standards

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — A hydraulic fracturing operator has sued an oil and gas exploration and production company in New Mexico federal court, alleging that it is liable for damages to a well caused by the hydraulic fracture treatment and the company’s general failures to follow recognized industry standards and act as a reasonable prudent operator.
July 31, 2024
Worker Seeks Damages For Injury At Fracking Site, Also Claims Discrimination

OKLAHOMA CITY — A worker who alleges that he was injured while performing his duties on a hydraulic fracturing rig has sued a well services company and the fracking operator that owned the well where the incident took place, seeking an unspecified amount of compensatory and punitive damages.
July 29, 2024
Panel: Fracking Operator ‘Explicitly Authorized’ To Install Water Pipeline

ST. LOUIS — An Eighth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel has affirmed a lower court ruling that granted summary judgment to a hydraulic fracturing operator in a surface use dispute on grounds that the agreement between the parties was “unambiguous and explicitly authorized” the fracking company to install water pipelines on a landowner’s property as part of oil and gas extraction activities.
July 26, 2024
Court Says Fracking Company Did Not Exhaust Administrative Remedies In Fee Dispute

HARRISBURG, Pa. — In an unpublished opinion, the Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania has ruled that an energy company did not exhaust its administrative remedies in opposing fees levied on it by the Pennsylvania Public Utilities Commission (PUC) related to hydraulic fracturing wells, therefore the company’s petition for a judgment declaring that it was not responsible to pay the fees was dismissed.