When they Open Up the Surface Rights Act in the Spring?

[ASRG]

SRD minister, Dianna McQueen, has indicated "amendments" will be introduced to the Surface Rights Act in the spring session of the legislature in Alberta.
Speculation is these "amendments" will introduce changes into how costs are calculated for negotiations between land owners and energy companies.
The two most often mentioned will be "loss of use" and "adverse effect".

"Loss of Use" at present is a calculation of how much production will be lost. It is based on gross production loss....not net.....and not based on whether you can grow anything on it (this was decided a long time ago in the courts).

For example: If the lease/right of way was 4 acres on cropland, the average production of a common rotation would be the loss of use> Yr 1-barley, yr 2-barley, yr 3 canola.
The "new improved amendment" would specify a "province wide" price based on soil type> example: No.2 soil in Taber or Grand Prairie would be the same loss of use.

"Adverse effect" is generally described as the cost of farming around the lease/general nuisance/inability to enjoy your property. At present there is a wide variance between areas.....under the "new amendments" this would be standardized.

Generally we would suspect prices for both "loss of use" and "adverse effect" would fall substantially. It would pretty well eliminate most negotiations. There would be a set price with nothing much to argue about?

This is a very disirable out come for the oil and gas companies. Lower lease prices and basically eliminate the land agent.

[forage]

Maybe ,just maybe ASRG nobody has the intelligence to understand what you are forcasting here. The SR Act well be opened according to neighbor's daughter who works in SRD and to quote her is landowners aren't going to like the proposed changes. Forget attending the info session or stakeholder involvement tour as the rewrite is already done .
I believe we are just banging our heads against the wall trying to convince people this government is f_ _ king us over.

[mcfarms]

If these things occur they better be planning on spending their savings on guards for each well head and facility in Alberta because there are a lot more landowners out here then there are cops.

[mcfarms]

However that said unlike the bill2 slimey crap they are pulling if they try this and the landowbners can put a pencil on what they will be losing I have to think ALL MLA's rural and urban will hear about it loud and long, as it stands we already get a mere pittance if they think they are going to pay us less then I forsee widespread civil unrest on a scale I don't think this RED fraud gov't of oil lacky's can fathom.

[grassfarmer]

Yes, it's another piece of outrageous crap but lets not
kid ourselves - the urban MLAs won't we worried by it
- it doesn't affect their constituents. We've got to
remind ourselves constantly that we do not live in a
rural province any longer despite what we see looking
out our farmhouse windows. It's an urban province as
far as votes go and we have to come up with a new
strategy to deal with that.

[mcfarms]

and what do the peasants do when they are backed into a corner in Africa and other 3rd world countries when they have had enough, do we need to have a Alberta spring?

[grassfarmer]

Wouldn't do any harm. You know it's amazing how
much more respect you get shown once you've drawn
a line in the sand and said "no more" and proved you
meant it. If you cower, whimper and run you'll always
be on the run.

[ASRG]

We don't know for sure what would be in a revised Surface Rights Act.
A possible model would be the way municipalities purchase land for roads and other infrastructure.
There is basically a set price for land and loss of use. I haven't had much to do with these kind of deals but I do know Municipal Affairs almost never denies an expropriation request and the "Land Compensation Board" almost never adjusts the municipal prices. You can appeal an expropriation and compensation......something you couldn't do on an oil and gas project (under bill 2).
As I said....we don't know what amendments will be made to the Surface Rights Act. We know a few things though: CAPP has been lobbying for a more "competitive environment". We know they would like to get rid of the "$500/acre entry fee", so as to bring Alberta into line with Sask. and BC. We know they would like to eliminate or vastly reduce their land procurement costs. Every time the land agent has to visit you costs $2,000.
We know they would like to shift more of the environmental liability to the landowner.
All we can do right now is watch and see how far they intend to go.