Some analysts expect the recent drop in oil prices to double the number of bankruptcies in the oil and gas industry.
3L Kate Ortbahn’s award-winning paper about issues in such bankruptcies is not only timely but advances her professional goals.
Ortbahn’s paper, “Interests Get Interesting: Overriding Royalty Interests Characterization in Oil & Gas Bankruptcies,” won third place in the American Bankruptcy Institute’s (ABI) annual Bankruptcy Law Student Writing Competition. She received a $750 prize and a one-year ABI membership.
She will work with Judge Kevin Carey of the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Delaware to prepare her paper for publication in an ABI committee newsletter.
“Oil and gas law is a complicated area of the law, involving many unique types of property and production interests. When an oil and gas company enters bankruptcy, the two layers of law have to work together,” Ortbahn says. “My paper discusses interests unique to oil and gas, overriding royalty interests, and how their characterization in a particular case, ATP Oil & Gas Corporation, provides transactional lessons to practitioners to protect their clients’ interests.”
Ortbahn’s knowledge is particularly relevant in oil-rich Texas, where she will join the real estate section of the Haynes and Boone law firm in Dallas after graduation.
“As a practitioner, I hope to continue publishing pieces that condense a highly complex area of the law into a product that is more accessible for legal readers or even clients,” she says.
Ortbahn wrote the paper for professor Melissa Jacoby’s advanced bankruptcy seminar.
“Kate’s paper will be of interest to those who practice bankruptcy and those who work on other types of energy transactions, particularly if they are in distress. The paper also connects to broader debates about substance over form in commercial law, an issue we talk about a lot in secured transactions class,” Jacoby says.-May 5, 2016