Law, Strategy, and Risk in Commercial Disputes
Oil and gas cases seem to supply more than their share of fights about the meaning of contract terms. Why? We suspect it has something to do with money.
Take Total E&P USA, Inc. v. Kerr-McGee Oil & Gas Corp., No. 11-30038 (5th Cir. Mar. 12, 2013). In that case, two of three lessees…
Fix in your mind an image — of an offshore drilling rig. One that looks like a big boat. You see the derrick. It sits atop and in the middle of the boat. And then you notice something odd. The derrick has two tops, from each of which a string of metal depends. What gives?…
May a working interest owner in an offshore oil and gas lease avoid paying a share of the cost of decommissioning a platform that the lessee used to produce from the lease? If you had a Farmout Agreement like the one between predecessors in interest — the PIIs — of Apache Corporation and W&T Offshore…