individual leases it's not time by because all of the leases were issued within the six year statute of limitations in this case we challenge primarily the individual leasing decisions that deal and made not the big zoning decisions that are made across an entire resource planning area but rather a series of individual decisions made by the federal government to enter into a contract with an oil and gas company to explore and develop all of them in real estate which includes call that methane gas the basic problem here is that the state of the federal government sold away the development rights to the oil  ninety four permits provided for these little pieces that you're challenging the nine hundred ninety four resource management plan  you have the record was that the at the time of this lease issuance that there was a binding restriction that imposed a stipulation that restricted coal bed methane developments aspiration only that would be one set of danced in the district court by the oil companies i don't think really it had the full fleshing out perhaps it's still hasn't had the full flushing out and that's what i asked what the hell's think district court held the only unlimited rights another and the other side in the bill from  subsurface estate they needed to is that is there a way to have coal that nothing development that doesn't destroy your drinking water supply it doesn't put a compressor station or a road right next to your ranch house so it's like we're now getting the the record of decision dealing said we will design whether these lands are open to leasing with a standard stipulation i got fifty three twenty three what are we looking at on three twenty three oil and gas leasing development is the head full rights development all the mineral resources to areas that are going to be released with minor stipulations three areas that we're going to say no to development and critically and as they advise their line officers what they're supposed to do they have the exact same tripartite analysis when you develop a plan and you decide what's open to leasing understand release forms what need some special stipulations cbs specific stipulations when they sold those leases in one nine hundred ninety seven to two thousand and one there were no restrictions and when the only him took a look in two thousand and three and did a supplemental analysis on the coal bed methane issue they came to the exact same conclusion they said we're not going to consider in two thousand and three whether there are any special stipulations that are needed for coal bed methane to make sure that the oil companies don't sink a well right next to a ranch to ensure that the water doesn't dry up i'm confused about this i've just been looking at what you told me to look at th language under what decision is being made it looks like they made the decision in one thousand nine hundred four that you're challenging now now your honor they made the decision to say come on down boys these areas are open for leasing and standard stipulations they issued lea i don't understand why doesn't your honor we're challenging did they take a hard look underneath at the environmental impacts of leasing under each one of these individual leas look at are we going to protect the water supply that cranking water supply are we going to allow the company to put a compressor station in a hay field is there a way to have development and protect the ranch at the same time and they as an affirmative defense to say well we don't have to worry about that because they did everything wrong everything terrible and they made the decisions with utter hostility to the environment why didn't they do it in one before they did they absolutely did what they said worst all of the winds were contesting fall into this category there may be a few acres but almost all they said said if standard lease forms we're not going to restrict coal bed methane one iota we're not going to mention and your theory you never will do it and the only way ninety four comes into play is they say you don't have to worry about doing this environmental analysis when you issue the lease and because our case is they've never done that environmental  supposed to do it and you're out of court right i don't think they did i mean because you let it happen and contest that within the statute of limitations i don't think they did everything wrong in ninety four i think in ninety four coal bed methane was just on the horizon they didn't know it was a real problem and so they didn't really take into it into account but come one thousand nine hundred seven when they issued these leases they knew in the record is clear they knew the coal that nothing had been exploded and just across the border in wyoming that the oil companies were buying these leases because they wanted to develop recall that methane in one nine hundred ninety seven then the question was are they going to impose any kind of stipulations in that contract with the oil company that's going to restrict development or not and they failed to do so and our case is at that point when you hand over the contract have you done your duty to do the environmental analysis that ensures that there's a way to do business and protect the environment they didn't do it on the end under their theory they would never do it and the rancher would never be able to say don't put a compressor in my backyard thank you kathy thank you since we were fourteen point thirty seven just to make it ten minutes will take five minutes to do that i'd like to start really by talking about the issue of time bar and then move on to the nature of the lease right which is really at the heart of northern plains arguments with regard to the issue of t small scale development only full field development will not go forward without more additional environmental documentation here it makes it very clear all the parties to the leases understood that we understand that it's clear from the  bit about the nature of the least rights here since there have been a lot of allegations about what the nature of that right the court needn't go any further than our supplemental exercise record on page twenty seven where you can look up on the stock in itself is the standard for accident resource management plan and the extant resource management plan here said you're good you can go ahead with regards to drilling of test wells and initial small scale development but anything beyond that you can't do until the initial talking as against the world if anyone can go out and do it you can do it but that doesn't mean you can automatically go out and do it without any further steps in the trial could court understood that clearly there's no issue of two thousand and three  said we'd like to go forward with something we're calling the tongue or her project it's going to be two hundred fifty wells on how you know eleven of which were going to be on federal lands the remainder on privately hands of those one hundred eleven they included in the eleven that were explorator trapped through a variety of chemical processes that i won't get into here but it's there under pressure and the water is in the awkward in the coal that holds the gas when the gas is drawn out then the pressure is off the gas and the gas can be drawn out as well and so one of the issues is drawing that water out in what's going to be done with that water in again if you as if you didn't get enough water then it's from hard to get good wells the issue is  how much water you're taking out how that's going to affect the opera first and what the quality of that means groundwater right exactly and so if it is a concern and that's why it's does that mean you have to drill deeper to get good wells i think use about whether that will dry up an aco for i e so people who are in ranches may not have enough water for their purposes there are issues about the quality of the water that's being taken out and what's being done with that with whether it's fresh clean water or whether it's water that's for example you know i mean if we argued that feel analysis was very adequate but in fact your honor has an excellent point that even if it had been inadequate that's your relevant here because of the statute of limitations problem because of their failure the pressure of some of the water not you don't deal water the ocker and it's not permanent but you have to be pressurized so that you pump that water out and the question the question is twofold what impact does that have on wells in the area and what do you do with are you compile either of those issues are at issue here and they've received i say ends of thousands of pages of study and millions if not billions of words in montana in the last three or four  i did look at my brief and counted up cases there are five cases pending in montana and wyoming to this there's two other cases which may be why she thought there were seven ending challenging specific decisions by the eleventh but as i say they're not at issue here i first of all like to address a point judge bertelsmann made about the trial court's holding and i think you are absolutely correct the trial court looked at what fourteenth agreed on completely with that holding the supreme court said r m p's control and so the rights that my clients received we're subject to four for exploratory purposes all of those wells have and catch or shut in what that means is i think five of them have been abandoned because they're not or they don't appear to be fruitful for gas development purposes the ones that were abandoned were capped and they haven't even been put on line yet in the development and economic development so as a factual matter i think it's clear not in the small believe is that c b s was there everyone knew it was there be alarmed knew it was there and it had to be all they have to do was say go ahead and go get it that's not the case corporations don't invest the millions and millions of dollars to get that resource out of the ground without doing exploration and that's exactly what happened here eleven well and they went and got the information and based on that then they came back and said we'd like to do actual development and as mr frost pointed out that resulted in a full scale which came out finally in two thousand and three create your attention today you have any questions i'd be happy to try to answer thank you  environmental document tied to the development everything should be fine where our i don't know arms let me read and that intelligence to the two thousand and three let me read from that environmental impact the right to explore and develop c b m that's under alternatives considered but not analyzed why aren't they going to look at it because they've already given the right to develop into the oil companies go back to the ninety four decision take a look at that where the actual decision is the decision is going to sort these lands into three categories four categories standard least of elations minor stipulations major stipulations no surface occupancy they did that storing and in that sorting they decided that these plans would be open to development but when they looked at the environmental impact they realized that culvert nothing was still on the horizon and they didn't really understand what was exploratory wells and small scale development evidently they decided back before the limitations period that it is open to you to challenge their small items that on the cutting room floor we're not even to get to this we're not going to study it we're not going to look at it third will be i'm feelin issued these leases they didn't in any stipulations or any contract terms that we scripted development by stipulation in force when you look at results you decide that a particular well is by its nature of lord who are small scale why would you have to say more they can't they can pull out all the did that analysis in two thousand and three they said we already conferred when these leases were issued the development rights back and why did b l m need to suspend any of these lease rights when the oil companies came forward instead gee we can't develop for but there's no nothing to suspend if you have no right and finally when fidelity came forward and said we've got it still feel development poza we want to go forward with bill and didn't look at the record deal and didn't say you've got no rights to develop b said wait a second we've got a little bit more paperwork to do and you've got a right to develop and that will solve the clients that i represent because they never had their day in court before this contract was entered into where they could say protect my water source or protect well i think i've explained why from our standpoint there's a choice here between ranching and call that nothing development and it involves the water and these ranchers that never have their day in court on what lease that relations will protect the ranch and under the government