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Mealey's Fracking

  • August 11, 2025

    Energy Company Asks Texas High Court To Deny Review In Fracking Contract Dispute

    AUSTIN, Texas — An energy company has filed a brief in the Texas Supreme Court opposing a petition to review a ruling in a dispute over a joint operating agreement (JOA) related to hydraulic fracturing wells, arguing that the JOA in question empowers any party to propose a drilling operation and have that operation performed, but the petition for review asks the Supreme Court to “sanction a scheme to defeat this contractual right.”

  • August 11, 2025

    29 Members Of Congress Send Letter To DOI Urging It To Keep The Arctic Protected

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — Twenty-nine members of the U.S. Congress have sent a letter to Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum and the acting director of the U.S. Bureau of Land Management (BLM), urging the U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI) not to rescind the BLM’s 2024 rule that governs the protection of the National Petroleum Reserve-A (NPR-A), saying that repealing the rule “would not only be inconsistent with the law but would risk irreversible harm to the Western Arctic’s climate, wildlife, and communities.”

  • August 08, 2025

    Group Seeks To Uphold Fracking Ban In Delaware River Basin Amid Drilling Talks

    WEST TRENTON, N.J. — The Delaware River Frack Ban Coalition (DRFBC) is attempting to gain support for its effort to uphold the ban on hydraulic fracturing that is currently in place for the Delaware River Basin (DRB) by asking individuals to sign a pledge to protect the basin.

  • August 08, 2025

    Environmental Groups Challenge EPA’s Move To Delay Implementing Methane Standards

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — Environmental advocacy groups have sued U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lee Zeldin and the EPA in the District of Columbia Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals, challenging the EPA’s final action that extended deadlines for performance standards regarding methane that is produced during hydraulic fracturing operations.

  • August 07, 2025

    Report On National Petroleum Reserve Raises Concerns About Fracking In The Arctic

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — The Wilderness Society (TWS) on Aug. 7 released a report assessing the ecological and cultural values within the National Petroleum Reserve–Alaska (NPR-A), finding that the NPR-A, which is slated for hydraulic fracturing development under President Donald J. Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act, “may be one of North America’s critical climate refugia for wildlife in the future.”

  • August 07, 2025

    Minors Say Fracking Company’s ‘Negligent And Reckless’ Operations Caused Injuries

    PITTSBURGH — A group of minors on Aug. 6 sued a hydraulic fracturing operator in Pennsylvania federal court contending it is liable for damages for its “negligent and reckless operations of a natural gas compressor station, natural gas wells, and their appurtenances.”

  • August 06, 2025

    Agency: Rig Decommissioning Case Tries To ‘Fit Square Peg Into A Round Hole’

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum and other federal energy officials have filed a summary judgment reply brief in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, arguing that the environmental group that is asserting a claim under the Administrative Procedure Act (APA) for the defendants’ alleged failure to comply with the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) related to the decommissioning of offshore hydraulic fracturing rigs is “trying to fit a square peg into a round hole” and is attempting to “use this lawsuit as a vehicle to challenge the general state of idle oil and gas infrastructure” in the Gulf of Mexico.

  • August 05, 2025

    Magistrate: Fracking Royalty Case Warrants Partial Grant Of Class Certification

    PITTSBURGH — A federal magistrate judge in Pennsylvania on Aug. 4 issued a report in which he recommended that leaseholders’ motion for class certification in their case against hydraulic fracturing operators for unpaid royalties be granted in part and denied in part, saying the plaintiffs have shown that the class is ascertainable but have not presented evidence to satisfy Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 23(b)(2).

  • August 05, 2025

    Court Lacks Jurisdiction Over Continental Shelf Law, Trump Administration Says

    LAKE CHARLES, La. — The Trump administration on Aug. 4 filed a brief in Louisiana federal court arguing that it lacks jurisdiction over claims brought by states and energy producers regarding the constitutionality of the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act (OCSLA) and contending that if former President Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s withdrawals of certain areas for offshore hydraulic fracturing are found to be permanent, they exceeded his authority under OCSLA.

  • July 31, 2025

    Panel Says Groups Fail To Link Federal Fracking Permits To Alleged Harm

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — A District of Columbia Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel has affirmed a lower court’s dismissal of a case brought by environmental groups against the U.S. government in a dispute over federal fracking permits in New Mexico’s Permian Basin and Wyoming’s Powder River Basin, ruling that the groups failed to sufficiently link the harm they alleged to the “discrete agency actions” they sought to reverse.

  • July 22, 2025

    Mineral Rights Owners Seek Approval Of Class Settlement Worth More Than $22.08M

    COLUMBUS, Ohio — Mineral rights holders on July 21 filed an unopposed motion in Ohio federal court for preliminary approval of a class action settlement in a long-running and complex dispute with a drilling company and hydraulic fracturing operators over royalty payments, proposing a settlement fund worth $22,086,769.31.

  • July 22, 2025

    Interior Secretary, Others Say Offshore Drilling Opponents Fail To State Claim

    LOS ANGELES — Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum and others on July 21 filed an answer in California federal court denying claims brought by environmental advocacy groups that allege that the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) is in violation of federal law related to offshore drilling and arguing that the plaintiffs fail to state a claim for which relief can be granted.

  • July 22, 2025

    Commission Reverses Ruling In Case That Could Affect Shale Antitrust Litigation

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — In a decision that could affect the multidistrict litigation pending against oil and gas companies for alleged antitrust violations for conspiracy to fix prices, the Federal Trade Commission issued an order setting aside a prior decision by the FTC during the Biden administration that held that Exxon Mobil Corp.’s acquisition of Pioneer Natural Resources Co. violated antitrust law.  The FTC said, “No court would ever hold that Exxon’s acquisition of Pioneer violated the antitrust laws.”

  • July 16, 2025

    Slovak Republic Seeks To Enforce 2.3M Euro Attorney Fee Award Against U.S. Driller

    DALLAS — The Slovak Republic filed a petition in Texas federal court to enforce an International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) award in which a tribunal rejected a U.S. oil drilling company’s $133 million claim for impairing its investment and instead ordered the driller to pay the Republic’s attorney fees and arbitration costs.

  • July 14, 2025

    Trump’s Signature Act Expands Fracking, Cuts Royalties, Rescinds Methane Charge

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — The One Big Beautiful Bill Act of 2025 (OBBBA) expands federal leasing for hydraulic fracturing and conventional oil drilling in onshore and offshore locations by mandating federal lease sales in the Gulf of Mexico and Alaska’s Cook Inlet, by opening at least 20 million acres in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska for drilling, by making at least 1.6 million acres in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) available for drilling by 2032 and by reducing onshore royalties for new leases.

  • July 11, 2025

    Landowner: Fracking Company’s Bid To Compel Arbitration Is ‘Severely Flawed’

    CLARKSBURG, W.Va. — A landowner who is suing a hydraulic fracturing operator in a royalty payment dispute has filed a brief in West Virginia federal court arguing that the company’s motion to compel arbitration and stay the case is “severely flawed on its face and is replete with omissions which swiftly undercut” its “misguided request.”

  • July 11, 2025

    Federal Agencies Balk At Group’s FOIA Request Tied To Trump’s Energy Order

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI) and other federal agencies have filed an answer in a federal court in the District of Columbia, denying allegations brought by an environmental group that contends that the agencies are withholding records pertaining to how they are implementing President Donald J. Trump’s executive order titled “Unleashing American Energy.”  The defendants say the group, which seeks the materials pursuant to a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request, is “not entitled to compel the production of any record or portion of any record protected from disclosure by one or more of the exclusions or exemptions” to FOIA.

  • July 10, 2025

    States Want To Intervene In Youths’ Suit Over Fossil Fuel Executive Orders

    BUTTE, Mont. — A group of 19 sovereign states and one territory led by Montana want in on a federal lawsuit filed by 22 minors and young adults against President Donald J. Trump and several government agencies seeking to rescind and declare unconstitutional a series of executive orders that include directives to increase fossil fuel production, alleging “unique interests” in the case due to threats to their economies, use of land and budgets if the orders are eliminated.

  • July 10, 2025

    Group Reasserts Standing To Challenge Decommissioning Of Offshore Oil Rigs

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — An environmental group has filed a combined brief in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia arguing that it has standing and it has a claim that is justiciable under the Administrative Procedure Act (APA) against Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum and other federal energy officials for their failure to comply with the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) related to the decommissioning of offshore hydraulic fracturing rigs.

  • July 10, 2025

    Energy Company Reiterates Its Stance That Offshore Fracking Lease Challenge Fails

    LOS ANGELES — An energy company has filed a reply brief in California federal court arguing that oil and gas operations in the Santa Ynez Unit were approved previously by the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement (BSEE), yet environmental groups ask the court to “ignore these inconvenient facts and second-guess the BSEE” in a way that the U.S. Supreme Court “unequivocally rejected” in its recent decision in Seven Cnty. Infrastructure Coal. v. Eagle Cnty., Colo.

  • July 09, 2025

    Agency, Fracking Trade Group Say Case Over Final Rule For Offshore Leasing Fails

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) and the American Petroleum Institute (API), which are engaged in a dispute with environmental groups over a final rule issued by the BOEM in 2020 that updated air quality control and reporting and compliance regulations governing oil and gas operations on the Outer Continental Shelf, have filed reply briefs in a federal court in the District of Columbia. The BOEM argues that the groups’ challenge lacks merit, and the API says that challenge is “misguided.”

  • July 09, 2025

    Texas High Court Says Fracking Operator Gets Rights To Produced Water

    AUSTIN, Texas — In a case of first impression, the Texas Supreme Court has ruled that a hydraulic fracturing lease “using typical language to convey oil-and-gas rights” gives the fracking operator rights to what is referred to as produced water.  The court said that if the surface owner wants to retain ownership of that water, the reservation or exception from the mineral conveyance “must be express and cannot be implied.”

  • July 08, 2025

    Plaintiffs Say Defendants’ Citation To Supplemental Authority In Shale Case Fails

    ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — The plaintiffs in multidistrict antitrust litigation against shale oil producers on July 7 filed a brief in New Mexico federal court arguing that a case asserted by the defendants as supplemental authority in support of their motion to dismiss is “distinguishable from the present case on multiple grounds,” and the case should not be dismissed because investigations by the Federal Trade Commission “uncovered evidence of collusive communications to restrict output” of oil.

  • July 01, 2025

    In Fracking Saga, States Say Continental Shelf Law Is Partly Unconstitutional

    LAKE CHARLES, La. — States and a coalition of energy producers that operate in the Gulf of Mexico on June 30 filed a brief in Louisiana federal court seeking summary judgment and a declaration deeming part of the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act (OCSLA) unconstitutional under the nondelegation doctrine.  They also seek a ruling that former President Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s withdrawal memos related to offshore hydraulic fracturing were “unlawful and ultra vires” because they were issued under the OCSLA section in question in a long-running dispute that has spanned presidential administrations.

  • June 17, 2025

    Split Panel ‘Largely’ Affirms Ruling On Willow Project, Remands Without Vacatur

    SAN FRANCISCO — A divided panel of the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals on June 16 “largely” affirmed a lower court’s order that granted summary judgment for government defendants in a hydraulic fracturing dispute related to the Willow Project, a fracking operation in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska. The majority remanded the case without vacatur, holding that some aspects of the government’s approval of the project were “arbitrary and capricious” but that other elements of the decision complied with federal law.