Energy companies are increasingly suing South Texas landowners as they work to build pipelines to accommodate surging oil and gas production.
The question isn't whether a company can route a pipeline across a property owner's land. Pipeline companies, under Texas law, wield the power of eminent domain and can use it to acquire an easement even if the property owner opposes it. But landowners can negotiate for compensation and when those talks break down, companies can file suit.
In 2011, pipeline companies have filed at least 184 lawsuits against landowners in four South Texas counties, compared with 28 all of last year. The increase in lawsuits comes ahead of a change in state law that will make it harder for pipeline companies to condemn land for easements after Sept. 1, though the companies say they haven't changed their approach in anticipation of the new law.
Condemnation suits have jumped in other communities where energy companies have ramped up production, increasing demand for pipelines. Pipeline companies in Pennsylvania filed 61 lawsuits in 2009 compared with 16 in 2008, according to federal court records, as producers unlocked greater volumes of natural gas from the rock layer known as the Marcellus shale.
But the push for new pipelines is particularly intense in South Texas's Eagle Ford shale, a 250-foot thick layer of rock that is dense with oil and gas, where natural gas production nearly quadrupled and oil production increased tenfold from 2009 to 2010, according to data from state regulators.
The boom has brought substantial wealth to local governments and some landowners with petroleum-rich acreage. For others, it has brought pipelines across their property against their will.
Source: Wall Street Journal
No comments:
Post a Comment