landowner

Pickens: It's All about the Mineral Owners (Forbes)

FROM FORBES

And then, says Pickens, there’s perhaps the biggest factor in America’s favor: private ownership of mineral rights. America is virtually unique in the world in that private landowners, rather than the state, hold title to the oil and gas under their acres. With average royalty rates in Texas paying landowners 25% off the top for any oil and gas recovered, that’s an enormous incentive for ranchers and farmers to welcome drilling rigs onto their land. That’s not the case in Russia, Mexico, China, the Middle East, and virtually everywhere else — where the government owns the minerals and farmers have to be coerced into giving access to drillers.

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Permalink Reply by jim weyland on September 25, 2014 at 7:51

keith,

it's my understanding that the u.s. is the only nation in the world where mineral interests are not owned by the 'king'.

i've always found it an interesting contradiction that in the u.s. the 'king' does own the free-ranging wildlife that live on one's property.

jim


Oil & Gas ProPermalink Reply by Dion Warr, CPL on September 25, 2014 at 8:23

Group:

There are owners of freehold rights (selected minerals) in Canada to hydrocarbons - but a large owner of those rights is EnCana, who ended up with most of the mineral assets transferred to the Canadian Pacific RR.  Updated link, here.

I'll poke around to see if I can find others - but there would be very few.

Update - Trinidad and Tobago (severance prior to 1904) here.

Update (still developing as to status and implementation) - India Supreme Court rules in favor of private mineral ownership - reverses former settled law - link here.


Oil & Gas ProPermalink Reply by Skip Peel - Mineral Consultant on September 25, 2014 at 8:51

I suspect energy companies pursuing exploration projects in Texas cringe at the statement that the average royalty is 25%.  If T. Boone said it, it must be true!  LOL!  Makes one wonder who in Texas is getting 28 to 33% royalty in order to make the average 25%.


landownerPermalink Reply by Keith Mauck (Site Publisher) on September 26, 2014 at 3:20

haha, yes, some cringing going on because of that

Permalink Reply by jim weyland on September 25, 2014 at 10:48

dion,

i believe i now stand corrected as to my only.

i guess t-bone's virtually unique is/was correct.

thanks and best regards,

jim

p.s. it'd be an interesting bet: which is tallest, h. ross, t. boone or m. mouse? but, imo, there'd be no contest as to which made the most money.


landownerPermalink Reply by Martin on September 27, 2014 at 17:08

At least two of the three have magnificent ears.


Oil & Gas ProPermalink Reply by Dion Warr, CPL on September 29, 2014 at 3:07
John W:

My post was not meant to be nitpicky. AAPL's last annual meeting was in Montreal; the issue actually came up during the conference: "Why is it that America's Landmen are in Canada?" The above was part of that discussion. The links were not; I followed up via internet search for these. There may be a couple more; one would want to look for examples where sovereignty was obtained and private land ownership rights granted prior to the latter half of the 19th Century. What was discussed specifically is that valuable and locatable minerals in place (e.g., gold, silver, precious gems) were usually reserved to the sovereign after the Middle Ages; where the law had not quite caught up to the discovery of petroleum and the grants out of the sovereign did not reserve such a mineral, one may find that private claims on petroleum may exist and be held valid. Once the economic and strategic importance of petroleum was established, sovereign governments (including our own) made adjustments to conveyances and concessions so as to reserve rights to petroleum from such grants.

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