Ohio Supreme Court Issues Second Key Decision Interpreting Dormant Mineral Act

On November 5, 2015, in Chesapeake Exploration, L.L.C., et al. v. Kenneth Buell, et al., 2015-Ohio-4551, the Ohio Supreme Court issued its second decision interpreting Ohio's Dormant Mineral Act (the "ODMA"). The ODMA is a statute that allows a surface owner of a severed estate to have subsurface oil and gas rights deemed abandoned and vested in the surface owner if there has not been any specified savings activities, including any recorded title transactions, within a 20-year period. The case addresses two questions of state law certified from the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Ohio. By a five-justice majority, with four justices concurring in the reasoning, the court ruled that a recorded oil and gas lease is a "title transaction" sufficient to prevent the subject mineral rights from being deemed abandoned under the statute. The court also held unanimously that the unrecorded expiration of an oil and gas lease does not qualify as a "title