Last year, the Texas Supreme Court decided the case of Coyote Lake Ranch, LLC v. City of Lubbock that dealt with whether the “accommodation doctrine” should be applied to groundwater.
The accommodation doctrine is actually an oil and gas doctrine, which states that absent an agreement to the contrary, an oil-and-gas lessee has an implied right to use the surface of the land as reasonably necessary to produce and remove the minerals, but must exercise that right with due regard for the surface owner’s rights.
Coyote Lake Ranch, in Bailey County, Texas in the Texas Panhandle, is a fairly large ranch, used primarily for agriculture and raising cattle. Most of the ranch is covered with sand dunes covered by dune grasses, although some parts of the Ranch are irrigated cropland. The Ranch gets its water from the Ogallala Aquifer, which is the principal source of water for the high plains of Texas and several other states, including Lubbock.
The post Texas Supreme Court: the Texas Accommodation Doctrine Applies to Groundwater appeared first on Texas Attorney Blog.