Carbon Storage After North Dakota: Structuring Storage Rights That Survive Takings Challenges

Joseph A. Schremmer, Eugene O. Kuntz Chair in Law in Oil, Gas & Natural Resources | University of Oklahoma College of Law

Joseph A. Schremmer holds the Eugene O. Kuntz Chair in Law in Oil, Gas, & Natural Resources at the University of Oklahoma College of Law, where his scholarship centers on property rights in subsurface natural resources, including pore space, correlative rights, subsurface trespass, and split estates. His recent writing includes Reflections on the “Pore Space Estate” (ONE J, 2025) and Pore Space Property (Utah L. Rev., 2021), alongside a series of articles on conflicts between carbon capture and storage projects and mineral development. As of 2024 he is the sole update and revision author of Kuntz, A Treatise on the Law of Oil and Gas (Matthew Bender), and he co-authors The Law of Oil and Gas: Cases and Materials (Foundation Press).

• Education & Credentials

Professor Schremmer earned his J.D. and M.B.A. from the University of Kansas in 2013, following a B.A. and a B.S. from the University of Kansas in 2009. He is a member of the Kansas Bar. In law school he served as editor-in-chief of the Kansas Law Review and received the Samuel Mellinger Award, which recognizes the top overall graduate in scholarship, leadership, and service.

• Recognition & Leadership

In addition to the Kuntz Chair, Professor Schremmer serves as faculty director of the College of Law’s Oil and Gas, Natural Resources, and Energy Law Center and its Energy and Natural Resources Graduate Program. Before joining OU Law in 2023, he was the Judge Leon Karelitz Oil and Gas Law Professor at the University of New Mexico School of Law. During his years in practice, he was recognized multiple times as a Rising Star by Super Lawyers.

• Professional Involvement

He is a trustee of the Foundation for Natural Resources and Energy Law, sits on the advisory board of the Institute for Energy Law at the Center for American and International Law, and is a member of the Energy and Mineral Law Foundation.

• Experience

Professor Schremmer’s published work on subsurface property and carbon storage includes Conflicts and Confluences between Surface and Mineral Estates with CCUS (Wyo. L. Rev., 2024), The Potential for Conflicts between CCS Projects and Mineral Extraction (LSU J. of Energy Law & Resources, 2024), The Concurrent Use of Land for Carbon Sequestration and Mineral Development (Baylor L. Rev., 2023), Subsurface Property Issues in Recent Litigation (Found. J. for Natural Resources & Energy L., 2024), A Unifying Doctrine of Subsurface Property Rights (Harv. Envtl. L. Rev., 2022), Subsurface Trespass: Private Remedies and Public Regulation (Neb. L. Rev., 2023), Ad Coelum and the Design of Property Rights (Tex. A&M J. Prop. L., 2023), and Subsurface Trespass in the Restatement (Fourth) of Property (Alabama L. Rev., forthcoming). He also co-authored Waste and the Governance of Private and Public Property (U. Colo. L.

Rev., 2022) and is the author of the forthcoming Advanced Introduction to U.S. Oil and Gas Law (Edward Elgar).

He teaches Oil and Gas, Oil and Gas Contracts, Property, and Contracts. Before entering academia, he practiced law in Wichita, Kansas, for six years, where his work covered most aspects of upstream oil and gas production, including title examination, transactional matters, proceedings before the state conservation commission, and civil litigation.

Myles Culhane, Shareholder | Greenberg Traurig, LLP

Myles Culhane is a shareholder in Greenberg Traurig’s Sacramento office whose practice concentrates on the acquisition of pore space, surface use agreements, and rights-ofway across the carbon capture and storage value chain, together with the long-tail liabilities and financial requirements that sequestration projects carry. He has served as lead legal counsel advising landmen on securing mineral and pore space rights and related surface use agreements in Texas, California, Louisiana, New Mexico, and Arkansas, and has prepared in-depth analyses of the potential long-term liabilities and mitigation measures associated with subsurface injection and storage of carbon dioxide and the conversion of depleted fields to sequestration. Trained as a chemical engineer before law school, he translates complex technical systems into regulatory and transactional strategies for clients managing liability, financing, compliance, and stakeholder support through the energy transition.

• Education & Credentials

Mr. Culhane earned his J.D. from Loyola Law School, Los Angeles, in 2005 and his B.S. in Chemical Engineering from The University of Texas at Austin in 1990. He is admitted to practice in California.

• Recognition & Leadership

Before joining Greenberg Traurig, Mr. Culhane spent fifteen years in-house at Occidental Petroleum Corporation (Oxy), from 2011 to 2026, rising to Deputy General Counsel – Climate after serving as Managing Counsel, Assistant General Counsel, and Associate General Counsel. He has authored and advocated policies to incentivize carbon capture, utilization, and storage project development, as well as regulatory reforms supporting clean fuel standards and the deployment of engineered and nature-based decarbonization projects.

• Professional Involvement

He contributes legal perspectives as a member of a multi-stakeholder international working group, including the Geneva Association and the Clean Energy Ministerial, examining financial assurance needs and the selection of financial instruments for CCUS projects. His practice areas at the firm span Energy & Natural Resources, Carbon Capture & Sequestration, Energy Transactions, Upstream Oil & Gas, Environmental, and Renewable Energy.

• Experience

Mr. Culhane’s sequestration matters include guiding federal and state UIC Class VI permitting and authorizations for the permanent geologic storage of carbon dioxide from the world’s largest direct air capture project, a multi-faceted undertaking encompassing capture, transportation, sequestration, pressure management, and the programs that monitor, measure, verify, certify, and report on storage and the generation of carbon dioxide removal credits. He has handled permitting and authorization of a site dedicated to the durable geological storage of carbon dioxide captured from a power plant, and he prepared and carried through agency review the first Permanence Certification application submitted under the CCS Protocol of California’s low carbon fuel standard.

He represented a global energy company before CARB in multiyear negotiations over two large climate solutions designed to reduce embedded carbon in transportation fuels and served as legal lead securing U.S. Department of Energy awards and funding for multiple decarbonization projects, from preparation and submittal through contract negotiation and the development of management procedures compliant with federal law, including the False Claims Act. His work has also supported the acquisition of geothermal resources and regulatory approvals for lithium extraction technologies, including leasing, land use, unitization, royalties, and CEQA. At Oxy he advised on major multi-party transactions, the expansion of anthropogenic carbon dioxide use in enhanced oil recovery (CO2-EOR), and strategies to maintain eligibility for federal 45Q tax credits, and he supported the development, authorization, and verification of the first commercial-scale direct air capture facility. Earlier in his career he held environmental, health, and safety management roles at National Oilwell Varco (Ameron International Corporation), Baxter, and Shell Oil Company. The representative matters described above were handled before he joined Greenberg Traurig, LLP.

SESSION 1 – Pore Space Amalgamation Statutes and the Takings Clause | 2:30pm – 3:30pm

This session maps the constitutional fault lines in state pore space amalgamation statutes following two December 2025 and March 2026 North Dakota district court rulings that struck down N.D.C.C. § 38-22 and revoked Summit Carbon Solutions’ storage permits. Attorneys will learn how the Loretto per se physicaltaking framework, the correlative rights doctrine gap, and state-specific compensation clause requirements interact across North Dakota, Wyoming, Montana, Louisiana, and higher-threshold states including Illinois, Colorado, and Alaska. Attendees will leave able to identify which structural features of an amalgamation statute create the greatest takings exposure and what distinguishes constitutionally durable frameworks from those already facing invalidation.

BREAK | 3:30pm – 3:40pm

SESSION 2 – When Forced Pooling Fails: A Transactional and Regulatory Playbook for Pore Space Acquisition | 3:40pm – 4:40pm

This session will provide transactional and regulatory attorneys with practical guidance for advising geologic sequestration project developers on voluntary pore space acquisition, particularly in jurisdictions where statutory pooling or amalgamation mechanisms are unavailable, uncertain, or subject to legal challenge. Recent North Dakota decisions illustrate potential constitutional and compensation-related vulnerabilities in statutory frameworks used to aggregate pore space interests. They also provide broader lessons for legislators, regulators, developers, landowners, and counsel evaluating alternatives to compulsory aggregation. The session will examine how voluntary acquisition strategies can reduce legal risk while supporting project timelines and economics. It will also address the selection and structuring of agreements that secure sufficient subsurface rights, access, and operational flexibility for project development and expansion.