Starting with a review of the history of the oil and gas lease and the implied covenants of under the lease, this section continues to a complete review of each major clause of a typical oil and gas lease. The section is concluded with a series of questions that address most lease maintenance questions. A fully “marked-up” lease is included for easy reading and interpretation.

A general overview of the various aspects of pooling and unitization are discussed. When we speak of “pooling” and “unitization”, we are talking about the processes of combining oil and gas leases and the merging of both royalty and working interests into units, thereby erasing the boundary lines that exist between the leases and interests. Numerous examples of problem situations are discussed.

Why do we do well trades? What is involved in making a deal? What are some of the more common types of trades? How can I calculate my working interest in a deal? These questions will be discussed in detail.

Approximately one-third of the mineral ownership of the US is owned by the federal government. These interests are managed by the Bureau of Land Management. While the majority of federal lands are in the western states, there are also federal lands in most of the other states. This discussion will cover how federal onshore leases are granted, the leasing process, and the process for forming federal exploratory units.

The federal government owns approximately 1.75 billion acres in the outer continental shelf area of the United States. This area contains a large percentage of US oil and gas reserves. This section will review the basics of management of these minerals by the Minerals Management Service and how leases are issued and managed.