Court Opinion

ID: 9728180
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 14:01:19.913265+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:25:46.595923
License: Public Domain

Newton, J.,
dissenting.
Notwithstanding that I heartily concur in the facts and the propositions of law set forth in the majority opinion, I find that I must respectfully dissent from the result reached. The majority opinion relies basically upon two propositions of law. The first is the law of capture which basically provides that one who drills an oil well upon his own land' may, without liability, pump the oil out from under his neighbor’s land. The second is the rule pertaining to correlative rights which means that each owner of property lying over a pool of oil shall be afforded an opportunity to obtain his just share of the oil.
The opinion is based upon the following facts. Plaintiff could not have profitably developed his lease. The amount of primary oil he could have recovered would not have paid for the expense of drilling. No secondary *401oil whatsoever could have been recovered without the efforts of the other owners who joined together in the organization referred to as Kenmac and instituted measures for the recovery of the secondary oil, each contributing his or its respective share toward the expense of such secondary recovery and each taking a proportionate risk of a profitable result. Plaintiff, in accordance with the rule of correlative rights, was afforded an opportunity to join in Kenmac, contribute to the expense, and sharé' in the profit to be derived from the recovery of secondary oil. He refused to do so. Had he joined, the venture would have been a profitable one for him and for his lessor, the State of Nebraska.
The picture presented is one in which it is apparent that plaintiff would have lost money had he drilled a well and sought to recover primary oil. If he had drilled the well when Kenmac instituted its secondary recovery process, plaintiff might have been able to recover from his own well sufficient secondary oil to have shown a profit, but this profit could only have been realized through the efforts of the other owners who joined in Kenmiac. The majority opinion states: “We have reached the conclusion that where the primary recoverable oil has been exhausted, all interested parties in the field must be offered an opportunity to join in any unitization project to recover secondary oil on a fair and equitable basis, and if any interested party refuses tó join he should not be permitted to capitalize on that refusal. To hold otherwise would discourage unitization and encourage rather than avoid waste.” I concur in this statement of principle, but if this principle is to be applied,-then plaintiff has no basis for recovery whatsoever and neither does plaintiff’s lessor. Quite conclusively, plaintiff would have lost money had he made an attempt to recover his share of the primary oil and he could not have shown a profit without the efforts of Kenmac in producing secondary oñ, a project in which he refused to-joinv If, therefore,’ he is permitted to recover, he is *402then being permitted to capitalize on his refusal to cooperate and to join in Kenmac.
In my opinion, the judgment should be reversed and the cause dismissed.