http://www.npagroup.co.uk/oilandmineral/offshore/oil_exploration/index.htm
Posted on 03/19/2005 4:50:11 PM PST by The Grim Freeper
Today, my mother asked me to come see something in their Los Gatos back yard. She took me out to the corner of their large lot (large for Los Gatos, anyway), and she pointed out to me some black, shiny substance seeping out of the ground in patches, and along a line about 10 feet in length. The last heavy rain had made this substance come to the surface.
I said "It looks like oil," and she said she thought so, too. I stuck my finger in it, and it was black, slick, and after I'd rubbed it around to almost a drying point, a little bit gunky. Like crude oil.
We know my parent's property sits on a water table, because the last big earthquake, they weren't anxious to sit in the house, so they sat on the ground, and the ground was all wet (even though it hadn't rained in months).
Also, the heavy rains have caused a number of cracks to appear and/or widen in the brick work and driveway and porches and patios of my parents older home. We definitely are expecting a "big one." We just don't know when, of course. We weathered the Loma Prieta earthquake with a minimum of property damage and some major "rattled" nerves.
But all that is to say, has anyone here ever heard of such a thing? Could crude oil be seeping to the ground surface due to the heavy rains? Could it be something else? If it's oil, what do we do? Do we report it?
Oil doesnt come from fossils!
This past year a bunch of houses in Redondo Beach were renedered very messy when some capped wells blew out....
More than likely they have no mineral rights.
In California, I believe nobody gets mineral rights, and I'm sure that's similar most places today.
That would be incorrect. Unless you or a previous owner has specifically relinquished any of the rights to your property, you still possess all of them, mineral rights included.
In California, "real estate" is the same as "real property" and includes land, fixtures to land, anything incidental or appurtenant to land, and anything immovable by law.
Incidental rights (as used above), includes air rights, surface rights, subsurface rights, mineral rights, water rights, riparian rights, littoral rights, and underground water rights.
Few people take the time to actually get a copy of their deed and covenants and read them through. It's not that hard to do and I would recommend you do so. If you (TGF) need help doing this in Santa Clara County, Freepmail me.
--Boot Hill
Getting rich was not the first thing that came to my mind. Possibly have to get out was. Is there an old landfill near your or was there one at one time.
I remember as a kid going to the dump on Saturdays and seeing the big black pond and the trucks backed up to it, all of them just letting their loads of waste oil run into the pit. Years latter they built homes right over that dump. All of them had problems with emissions from undergound.
Even if it was crude oil and you had rights to drill it, I don't think in California anyone is going to let you put in a well.
If you don't want it to become a problem, ignore it and hope it goes away when the rains subside. Otherwise, take some to a lab and have it tested. I would do that anyhow. If you find any refined chemicals in the sample, you will have your answer.
That's a lot more likely. And hope he does not put his hand in it anymore until he finds out.
Also, it will dissolve in kerosene or gasoline or mineral spirits.
Where are the liberal trolls that pop in from time to time saying there is not interesting discussion on FR. Heck, this thread is almost as good as when were learning and discussing everything there was to know about typefonts and old typewriters.
--Boot Hill
One comment regarding flammability. If it's heavy enough (mostly longer chain hydrocarbons), it will not burn of itself at room temperature, but will require a wick to burn.
If it dissolves in petroleum solvents but will not burn even with a wick, it could be big trouble (i.e. a chlorinated oil).
Be careful when you light the grill.
BTTT!!!!!
I was thinking along the same lines that perhaps a neighbor has been changing oil in his yard and dumping the old oil which has eventually seeped into other properties.
The sun is shining. The oil is shining (or irridescent), and it does have a green cast to it.
I don't think I'll try to burn it, but I do think I'll take it to be tested.
What's the legal description of your property. I'm gonna be buying a bunch of leases soon.
Just kidding, enviros would never let me drill 'em.;
Get the nasty stuff and burn it!
"Get the nasty stuff and burn it!a"
there ya go. Just thinking of all the new Caribou.
http://www.npagroup.co.uk/oilandmineral/offshore/oil_exploration/index.htm
The United States considers itself sovereign over California, so unless you have a specific mention of mineral rights in your title, you likely have NO mineral rights.
Examples of this are especially seen all through California concerning oil and water.
You can't in most places dig a well without paying for your own water to the local water company who leased the water rights from the State or Federal government.
Though I can't post scripture and verse here regarding the exact law, I have an additional memory that there were laws passed between 10-20 years ago that further eroded personal property rights at least in California.
I think that if you find oil on your own property, you may find it difficult or impossible to drill yourself for it.
There are some older personally owned properties with grandfathered water or oil wells that have retained some form of use or commission. I think they are like being legal non-conforming.
Granted, you have a certain level of airspace rights. This is most noticeable in areas like beaches where there is the view and people who built homes at lower levels near the beach in front of other homes might sell their airspace rights to their neighbors so the neighbor can build up and be guaranteed not to lose their view.
In general, I think California residents mineral rights have been vastly eroded over the last three decades, mostly by laws.
PS: I don't like it.
In addition, new laws may override titles with various rights, covenants or restrictions.
On the surface this seems impossible, but it happens in fact.
One grand example of this in California are all the titles with the restriction that you may never sell to a black person. The old racist stuff like that are null and void, and though mineral rights are not racist or similar in theory, the fact is mineral rights are valuable, and the government has done all it can to restrict your rights in recent decades.
Again, you are incorrect.
Unless you or a previous owner has specifically conveyed any of the myriad types of rights you have in your property, you still possess all of those property rights, mineral rights included. Nor does any law require an affirmative mention of mineral rights in your deed for you to own the mineral rights, they are inherent as incidental property rights to real property in California.
Since you say that you "can't post scripture and verse here regarding the exact law", I would suggest you start reading here: History of the Ownership of Mineral Rights.
In early California history there was some initial confusion over whether the state would continue to own the mineral rights, as was the law under the old Spanish system that existed prior to the 1848 Treaty of Guadeloupe Hidalgo, where Mexico formally relinquished its northern territories. But ever since 1858, when the California Supreme Court issued its ruling in Boggs v. Mercer Mining Co, it has been firmly established that mineral rights were inherently part of any surface owners' property title. The Boggs case was reaffirmed and extended by a 1955 Federal District court decision in Blue v. McKay.
--Boot Hill
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