A critical part of any mineral development project is acquiring rights to the mineral and surface necessary to profitably produce the resource. Real estate and mineral leases are an integral part of that effort, and clients often turn to Stites & Harbison to draft the required documents, recognizing that each transaction is often subject to local practice and customs.
These efforts are often reflected in the group's broad experience. Our attorneys...
- Regularly represent mining companies and mineral lessors in lease and coal reserve acquisition negotiations, due diligence evaluations of coal and other mineral reserves, as well as regulatory impacts on the extraction of potential mineral resources.
- Assist clients in a wide variety of fossil fuel and mineral resource matters, including coal, oil and gas, limestone, clay, sand and gravel, zinc and gold, and renewable resources such as timber.
- Work closely with clients in developing plans for mitigation of environmental impacts associated with resource development, as well as conservation easements in conjunction with resource extraction permitting and stand-alone easements in connection with preservation efforts by community and environmental groups.
- Represent mining companies in access issues and surface/mineral owner disputes.
- Advise clients on royalty dispute resolutions.
- Draft standard mineral reserve and development agreements for mining companies and individual lessors.
- Represented a mineral holding company against the federal government in the Court of Federal Claims on the grounds that its mineral property was taken by surface mining regulation.
- Represent mining companies and coal landholding companies in quiet title actions and title curative work.
- Draft all mineral lease agreements for a large, multi-state coal mining company.
- Regularly draft mineral royalty and contract mining agreements for several Appalachian-based land and mineral holding companies.
The firm's attorneys have been involved in many of the most important lawsuits affecting the mineral industry. These include litigation over the meaning of the phrase "valid existing rights" under the Surface Mining Control & Reclamation Act of 1977 and the taking of such rights by inverse condemnation.