Opinion ID: 510046
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Production--Production, What is Production?22

Text: 24 In order to understand this problem, it is necessary to clarify a term which has confounded the courts, as well as the Secretary, in the past. The word production is a horse of many colors. The Secretary and Judge Sear have juxtaposed two regulations, dealing with two totally distinct areas of oil and gas regulation in order to define the word value in this situation. 25 The term production is used in the oil and gas industry in several different but related senses. The term can be used to refer to an abstract noun: (i) the act or process of producing. It can also refer to either of two concrete nouns: (ii) the products of an oil and gas well, or (iii) the well itself. 23 The definition used by Judge Sear, that contained in 43 U.S.C. Sec. 1331(m), 24 relates to only one possible interpretation, the act or process of producing. Even accepting the proposition that production in these leases is used in the abstract noun sense, as in (i) above, this Court cannot accept the conclusion that Sec. 1331(m) was intended by Congress to define production to exclude all other accepted meanings in the industry, 25 including (ii) above, the actual products of an oil and gas well. With all due deference to the Secretary, juxtaposing the definition of Sec. 1331(m) onto these oil and gas leases makes little sense, either economically, logically or geologically. 26