Terms Used In New York Laws > Environmental Conservation > Article 23 - Mineral Resources

• Abandoned: means the cessation of mining and reclamation activities on land affected by mining without prior notification to the department of such cessation of activities or without describing such cessation in a mined land-use plan approved by the department, and after opportunity to be heard. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-2705
• Adjourn: A motion to adjourn a legislative chamber or a committee, if passed, ends that day's session.
• Affidavit: A written statement of facts confirmed by the oath of the party making it, before a notary or officer having authority to administer oaths.
• Amendment: A proposal to alter the text of a pending bill or other measure by striking out some of it, by inserting new language, or both. Before an amendment becomes part of the measure, thelegislature must agree to it.
• Amortization: Paying off a loan by regular installments.
• Applicant: means that person making application to the department for a mining permit. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-2705
• Appropriation: The provision of funds, through an annual appropriations act or a permanent law, for federal agencies to make payments out of the Treasury for specified purposes. The formal federal spending process consists of two sequential steps: authorization
• Assets: (1) The property comprising the estate of a deceased person, or (2) the property in a trust account.
• Beneficiary: A person who is entitled to receive the benefits or proceeds of a will, trust, insurance policy, retirement plan, annuity, or other contract. ^{Source: OCC}
• Buffer zone: means all that area outside and surrounding the underground gas storage reservoir which the department approves as appropriate to protect the integrity of the reservoir, no part of which shall be more than thirty-five hundred linear feet from the boundary thereof. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-0101
• Cavity: means an open or partially open space left after a salt has been solution mined. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-0101
• Commissioner: means the commissioner of environmental conservation. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-0101
• Complaint: A written statement by the plaintiff stating the wrongs allegedly committed by the defendant.
• Continuance: Putting off of a hearing ot trial until a later time.
• Contract: A legal written agreement that becomes binding when signed.
• Corporation: A legal entity owned by the holders of shares of stock that have been issued, and that can own, receive, and transfer property, and carry on business in its own name.
• Damages: Money paid by defendants to successful plaintiffs in civil cases to compensate the plaintiffs for their injuries.
• Defendant: In a civil suit, the person complained against; in a criminal case, the person accused of the crime.
• Department: means the department of environmental conservation. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-0101
• Dependent: A person dependent for support upon another.
• Deposition: An oral statement made before an officer authorized by law to administer oaths. Such statements are often taken to examine potential witnesses, to obtain discovery, or to be used later in trial.
• Discovery: Lawyers' examination, before trial, of facts and documents in possession of the opponents to help the lawyers prepare for trial.
• Donor: The person who makes a gift.
• Equitable: Pertaining to civil suits in "equity" rather than in "law." In English legal history, the courts of "law" could order the payment of damages and could afford no other remedy. See damages. A separate court of "equity" could order someone to do something or to cease to do something. See, e.g., injunction. In American jurisprudence, the federal courts have both legal and equitable power, but the distinction is still an important one. For example, a trial by jury is normally available in "law" cases but not in "equity" cases. ^{Source: U.S. Courts}
• Escrow: Money given to a third party to be held for payment until certain conditions are met.
• Evidence: Information presented in testimony or in documents that is used to persuade the fact finder (judge or jury) to decide the case for one side or the other.
• Executor: A male person named in a will to carry out the decedent
• Fiduciary: A trustee, executor, or administrator.
• Field: means the general area underlaid by one or more pools. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-0101
• Fiscal year: The fiscal year is the accounting period for the government. For the federal government, this begins on October 1 and ends on September 30. The fiscal year is designated by the calendar year in which it ends; for example, fiscal year 2006 begins on October 1, 2005 and ends on September 30, 2006.
• Fraud: Intentional deception resulting in injury to another.
• Fund: means the oil and gas fund as established in § 83-a of the state finance law. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-0101
• Gas: means all natural, manufactured, mixed, and byproduct gas, and all other hydrocarbons not defined as oil in this section. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-0101
• Grantor: The person who establishes a trust and places property into it.
• Guardian: A person legally empowered and charged with the duty of taking care of and managing the property of another person who because of age, intellect, or health, is incapable of managing his (her) own affairs.
• Jurisdiction: (1) The legal authority of a court to hear and decide a case. Concurrent jurisdiction exists when two courts have simultaneous responsibility for the same case. (2) The geographic area over which the court has authority to decide cases.
• land affected by mining: means the sum of that surface area of land or land under water which: (i) has been disturbed by mining since April first, nineteen hundred seventy-five and not been reclaimed, and (ii) is to be disturbed by mining during the term of the permit to mine. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-2705
• Lease: A contract transferring the use of property or occupancy of land, space, structures, or equipment in consideration of a payment (e.g., rent). ^{Source: OCC}
• Liabilities: The aggregate of all debts and other legal obligations of a particular person or legal entity.
• Lien: A claim against real or personal property in satisfaction of a debt.
• Liquefied natural or petroleum gas facility: means any structure or facility which is used for the storage or confinement of liquefied natural or petroleum gas, or for the conversion of liquefied natural or petroleum gas into natural gas. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-1705
• Litigation: A case, controversy, or lawsuit. Participants (plaintiffs and defendants) in lawsuits are called litigants.
• Local agency: means any local agency, board, authority, school district, commission or governing body, including any county, city, town, village or other political subdivision of the state. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-0101
• Majority leader: see Floor Leaders
• Mine: means any excavation from which a mineral is to be produced for sale or exchange, or for commercial, industrial or municipal use; all haulageways and all equipment above, on or below the surface of the ground used in connection with such excavation, and all lands included in the life of the mine review by the department. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-2705
• Mined land-use plan: means a document, consisting of a mining plan and a reclamation plan, which describes proposals for conduct of the applicant's mining operation and reclamation of the land to be mined to achieve the purposes of this title. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-2705
• Mineral: means any naturally formed, usually inorganic, solid material located on or below the surface of the earth. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-2705
• Mining: means the extraction of overburden and minerals from the earth; the preparation and processing of minerals, including any activities or processes or parts thereof for the extraction or removal of minerals from their original location and the preparation, washing, cleaning, crushing, stockpiling or other processing of minerals at the mine location so as to make them suitable for commercial, industrial, or construction use; exclusive of manufacturing processes, at the mine location; the removal of such materials through sale or exchange, or for commercial, industrial or municipal use; and the disposition of overburden, tailings and waste at the mine location. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-2705
• Mining plan: means a description of the applicant's mining operation which shall include maps, plans, written materials and other documents as required by the department. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-2705
• Natural gas: means natural or petroleum gas in a non-liquid or gaseous state, whether under pressure or otherwise, and whether or not the product of conversion from liquefied natural gas or liquefied petroleum gas. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-1705
• Non-conforming facility: means a liquefied natural or petroleum gas facility in actual use and operation on September first, nineteen hundred seventy-six which is exempted from the requirements of section 23-1707 but is subject to the requirements of section 23-1719. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-1705
• Oath: A promise to tell the truth.
• Obligation: An order placed, contract awarded, service received, or similar transaction during a given period that will require payments during the same or a future period.
• Oil: means crude petroleum oil and all other hydrocarbons, regardless of gravity, that are produced at the wellhead in liquid form by ordinary production methods and that are not the result of condensation of gas. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-0101
• Overburden: means all of the earth, vegetation and other materials which lie above or alongside a mineral deposit. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-2705
• Owner: means the person who has the right to drill into and produce from a pool or a salt deposit and to appropriate the oil, gas or salt he produces either for himself or others, or for himself and others. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-0101
• Partnership: A voluntary contract between two or more persons to pool some or all of their assets into a business, with the agreement that there will be a proportional sharing of profits and losses.
• Permit: means an environmental safety permit issued by the department pursuant to this title. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-1705
• Permittee: means any person who holds a valid mining permit from the department for the boundaries of the land identified in the mined land-use plan. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-2705
• Person: means any individual, public or private corporation, political subdivision, government agency, department or bureau of the state, municipality, industry, partnership, association, firm, trust, estate or any other legal entity whatsoever. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-2705
• Person: means and includes any natural person, corporation, association, partnership, receiver, trustee, executor, administrator, guardian, fiduciary, or other representative of any kind, and includes any department, agency or instrumentality of the state or any of its governmental subdivisions. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-0101
• Person: means any individual, corporation, partnership, association, cooperative or otherwise, trust or estate, governmental agency, authority, public benefit corporation, municipality or agency thereof, board or commission, or other public or private legal entity. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-1705
• Person engaged in mining: means a person who is subject to this title but who is mining without a mining permit issued by the department. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-2705
• Pool: means an underground reservoir containing a common accumulation of oil or gas or both; each zone of a structure which is completely separated from any other zone in the same structure is a pool. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-0101
• Producer: means the owner of a well or wells capable of producing oil, gas, or salt; or any salt or hydrocarbon mixture. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-0101
• Product: means any commodity made from oil or gas and includes refined crude oil, crude tops, topped crude, processed crude, processed crude petroleum, residue from crude petroleum, cracking stock, uncracked fuel oil, fuel oil, treated crude oil, residuum, gas oil, casinghead gasoline, natural-gas gasoline, kerosene, benzine, wash oil, waste oil, blended gasoline, lubricating oil, blends or mixtures of oil with one or more liquid products or by-products derived from oil or gas, and blends or mixtures of two or more liquid products or by-products derived from oil or gas, whether herein enumerated or not. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-0101
• Real property: Land, and all immovable fixtures erected on, growing on, or affixed to the land.
• Reclamation: means the conditioning of the affected land to make it suitable for any uses or purposes consistent with the provisions of this title. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-2705
• Reclamation plan: means a description of operations to be performed by the applicant to reclaim the land to be mined over the life of the mine. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-2705
• Recourse: An arrangement in which a bank retains, in form or in substance, any credit risk directly or indirectly associated with an asset it has sold (in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles) that exceeds a pro rata share of the bank's claim on the asset. If a bank has no claim on an asset it has sold, then the retention of any credit risk is recourse. ^{Source: FDIC}
• Remainder: An interest in property that takes effect in the future at a specified time or after the occurrence of some event, such as the death of a life tenant.
• Reservoir: means any underground reservoir, natural or artificial cavern or geologic dome, sand or stratigraphic trap, whether or not previously occupied by or containing oil or gas. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-0101
• Salt: means sodium chloride, evaporite or other water soluble minerals, either in solution or as a solid or crystalline material in a pure state or as a mixture. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-0101
• Service of process: The service of writs or summonses to the appropriate party.
• Solution mining: means the dissolving of an underground salt by water to produce a brine for transport to another underground or surface location for sale, processing or storage. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-0101
• Spoil: means any waste material removed from its natural place in the process of mining and all waste material directly connected with the cleaning and preparation of any minerals. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-2705
• Statewide spacing: means spacing units for gas or oil wells that are within ten percent of the following sizes, as applicable, unless another percentage is specifically stated:
  
  (i) For Medina gas pools at any depth, 40 acres with the wellbore within the target formation no less than 460 feet from any unit boundary, plus, if applicable, the number of additional acres necessary and sufficient to ensure that any horizontal wellbore within the target formation is not less than 460 feet from any unit boundary;
  
  (ii) For Onondaga reef or Oriskany gas pools at any depth, 160 acres with the wellbore within the target formation no less than 660 feet from any unit boundary, plus, if applicable, the number of additional acres necessary and sufficient to ensure that any horizontal wellbore within the target formation is not less than 660 feet from any unit boundary;
  
  (iii) For fault-bounded Trenton and/or Black River hydrothermal dolomite gas pools where the majority of the pool is between 4,000 and 8,000 feet deep, 320 acres with the proposed productive section of the wellbore within the target formation no less than one-half mile from any other well in another unit in the same pool and no less than 1,000 feet from any unit boundary that is not defined by a field-bounding fault but in no event less than 660 feet from any unit boundary;
  
  (iv) For fault-bounded Trenton and/or Black River hydrothermal dolomite gas pools where the majority of the pool is below 8,000 feet, within five percent of 640 acres with the proposed productive section of the wellbore within the target formation no less than one mile from any other well in another unit in the same pool and no less than 1,500 feet from any unit boundary that is not defined by a field-bounding fault but in no event less than 660 feet from any unit boundary;
  
  (v) For shale gas pools at any depth, for a vertical well outside any existing spacing unit for the same formation, 40 acres with the wellbore within the target formation no less than 460 feet from any unit boundary;
  
  (vi) For shale gas pools at any depth, for a horizontal well outside any existing spacing unit for the same formation and with a written commitment from the well operator to drill infill wells pursuant to subdivision 4 of section 23-0503 of this title, with all horizontal infill wells in the unit to be drilled from a common well pad within three years of the date the first well in the unit commences drilling, notwithstanding the ten percent tolerance specified in this subparagraph, up to 640 acres with the initial horizontal wellbore or wellbores within the target formation approximately centered in the spacing unit and no wellbore in the target formation less than 330 feet from any unit boundary;
  
  (vii) For shale gas pools at any depth, for a horizontal well outside any existing spacing unit for the same formation and in the absence of a written commitment from the well operator to drill infill wells pursuant to subdivision 4 of section 23-0503 of this title, 40 acres with the wellbore within the target formation no less than 330 feet from any unit boundary plus the number of additional acres necessary and sufficient to ensure that the wellbore within the target formation is not less than 330 feet from any unit boundary;
  
  (viii) For all other gas pools where the majority of the pool is above the depth of 4,000 feet, 80 acres with the wellbore within the target formation no less than 460 feet from any unit boundary, plus, if applicable, the number of additional acres necessary and sufficient to ensure that any horizontal wellbore within the target formation is not less than 460 feet from any unit boundary;
  
  (ix) For all other gas pools where the majority of the pool is 4,000 to 6,000 feet deep, 160 acres with the wellbore within the target formation no less than 660 feet from any unit boundary, plus, if applicable, the number of additional acres necessary and sufficient to ensure that any horizontal wellbore within the target formation is not less than 660 feet from any unit boundary;
  
  (x) For all other gas pools where the majority of the pool is 6,000 to 8,000 feet deep, 320 acres with the wellbore within the target formation no less than 1,000 feet from any unit boundary, plus, if applicable, the number of additional acres necessary and sufficient to ensure that any horizontal wellbore within the target formation is not less than 1,000 feet from any unit boundary;
  
  (xi) For all other gas pools where the majority of the pool is below 8,000 feet, within five percent of 640 acres with the wellbore within the target formation no less than 1,500 feet from any unit boundary, plus, if applicable, the number of additional acres necessary and sufficient to ensure that any horizontal wellbore within the target formation is not less than 1,500 feet from any unit boundary;
  
  (xii) For oil pools in the Bass Island, Trenton, Black River, Onondaga reef or other oil-bearing reefs at any depth, 40 acres with the wellbore within the target formation no less than 460 feet from any unit boundary, plus, if applicable, the number of additional acres necessary and sufficient to ensure that any horizontal wellbore within the target formation is not less than 460 feet from any unit boundary; and
  
  (xiii) For all other oil pools at any depth, the wellbore within the target formation shall be no less than 165 feet from any lease boundary. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-0501
• Statute: A law passed by a legislature.
• Subpoena: A command to a witness to appear and give testimony.
• Tailings: means material of inferior quality or value resulting from the removal, preparation or processing of minerals. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-2705
• Testimony: Evidence presented orally by witnesses during trials or before grand juries.
• Trustee: A person or institution holding and administering property in trust.
• Venue: The geographical location in which a case is tried.
• Waste: means
  
  a. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-0101
• Well operator: means the applicant for a permit to drill, deepen, plug back or convert a well subject to this title and titles 7 and 9 of this article, or the actual operator of the well if the well is not operated by the original applicant. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-0501
• well permit: means a permit to drill, deepen, plug back or convert a well for production of oil or gas. See N.Y. Environmental Conservation Law 23-0501