Anadarko | Chesapeake Energy | Energy Companies | Industrywide Issues | Lease & Royalty Payments | Litigation | Pennsylvania | Statewide PA
PA Supremes Hear Oral Arguments in Can of Worms Royalty Lawsuit
On Wednesday the Pennsylvania Supreme Court heard oral arguments in a case challenging whether or not the state Attorney General’s office has the right to use a consumer protection law to prosecute companies like Chesapeake Energy and Anadarko over royalty payment shenanigans. The law the AG’s office wants to use has never been used that way before. According to legal experts, drillers are very concerned if the AG’s office wins this one, as we reported last November (see Chesapeake Royalty Lawsuit at PA Supreme Court – Can of Worms?).
Read More “PA Supremes Hear Oral Arguments in Can of Worms Royalty Lawsuit”
Chesapeake Energy keeps winning Ohio royalty lawsuits in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. In March the company beat a lawsuit by a group of Ohio landowners who claimed Chessy had cheated them out of a collective $30 million in royalties (see 
Last time we wrote about a zoning ordinance in Murrysville Township (Westmoreland County) was three years ago, in May 2017, when the town and local drillers struck a compromise on the distance of setbacks (see 
One of the worst overreaches and offenses of the Obamadroids was to redefine what “waters of the United States” (or WOTUS) actually means. As they were getting ready to leave power, the Obama EPA redefined WOTUS as everything down to large mud puddles–no lie (see 
On October 3, 2016, landowner James Slamon filed a lawsuit against Carrizo and Reliance Industries in the Susquehanna County (PA) Court of Common Pleas. Slamon alleged Carrizo and Reliance underpaid royalties on oil and gas leases to him and a class of other landowners “exceeding one hundred members.” The drillers got the case moved to federal court on October 31, 2016. Fast forward to this past Monday and a judge in the federal court case has certified (in part) the class-action request. The lawsuit will now move forward.
A leftist anti-fossil group calling itself Protect PT, in Penn Township (Westmoreland County), PA, backed with big money from Big Green groups, has for years challenged Penn Township ordinances that allow Apex Energy and Huntley & Huntley (now Olympus Energy) to drill and operate shale wells. Protect PT has finally struck out, permanently, at the Pennsylvania Supreme Court.
In May 2016, a landowner in Wayne County, PA filed a lawsuit against the Delaware River Basin Commission (DRBC) asking a judge to declare that the DRBC does not have jurisdiction to prevent the construction of a natural gas well (see 
Last July MDN broke the news that LOLA Energy had filed a lawsuit in Greene County, PA against EQT for allegedly drilling shale wells under property EQT formerly leased, but property for which the leases had lapsed and were subsequently scooped up by LOLA Energy II (see 
The full U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia (DC Circuit) heard oral arguments yesterday in a case of major importance to the future of all federally-approved pipeline projects. The case revolves around the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission’s (FERC) use of something called a tolling order in approving Atlantic Sunrise Pipeline (in the PA Marcellus). Big Green groups launched the lawsuit in an effort to strip away FERC’s right to use tolling orders when considering requests to “rehear” decisions to approve pipelines.
A Standford University professor who sued another scientist who dared to criticize his wacky views on renewable energy in a journal article sued the scientist and the journal for defamation. It took a while for the lawsuit to play out (two years), but a judge in the case recently ruled the Standford prof was wrong in filing the lawsuit and must now pay the attorney’s fees for those whom he sued. Sweet justice.
Disgusting anti-fossil fuel lunatics have hassled the Keystone XL oil pipeline in the Midwest with frivolous lawsuits for years. Last week an Obama-appointed liberal judge serving in Montana, U.S. District Judge Brian Morris, vacated a permit for the Keystone project, once again stopping construction. The permit vacated was issued by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and is called a Nationwide Permit 12–the equivalent of a Section 401 permit under the Clean Water Act–allowing projects like pipelines to be built across or under streams, rivers and “wetlands” (swamps). The problem with the judge’s action is that it potentially affects all pipeline projects across the country using an NP12 permit–including the delayed Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP), a 303-mile Marcellus/Utica gas pipeline from West Virginia to southern Virginia.
There is an ongoing question of whether or not the Ohio Marketable Titles Act (MTA), which impacts Utica shale rights, can be used to return previously severed mineral rights back to a surface landowner, or whether the MTA is superseded by Ohio Dormant Minerals Act (DMA). In February 2019, Ohio’s Seventh District Court of Appeals said the MTA *does* still apply to mineral rights (see