An apt acronym reflecting many of the ways the standard leases are bad, and also how a lessor likely feels when presented with the form lease, is D-I-S-T-U-R-B-E-D.

D       Description of property. Stock leases rake in any other property you might own now or in the future, even though you may not know or intend this.

I       Indefinite term. The stated five-year term provision is usually followed by five or six provisos that give great discretion to the lessee to extend the lease indefinitely by merely conducting tests, or even planning to conduct drilling either on your property or anywhere on the unit that your property is part of — while you get no compensation.

S       Surface use. The granting clause usually gives the lessee extremely broad rights to surface and subsurface use of your property as lessee desires, including water, roads, surface and subsurface storage, pipelines, equipment, tanks, compressors and wells. Unless any limitations are clearly stated in the lease, there are none.

T       Title representations. Form leases include broad, unconditional lessor warranties and representations as to title to the property. Most lessors do not have the faintest idea what this means, and of the significant liability it creates for the lessor.

U       Unitization, pooling. Many stock leases have no limitation whatsoever on the size of a unit, and leave that purely up to the desire of the lessee. Lack of a reasonable unit size can be extremely damaging to the lessor by allowing the lessee to hold lessor's property by possession with minimal investment somewhere in the unit, and by watering down the lessor's royalty interest.

R       Royalty determination. Many standard royalty clauses allow the lessee to deduct many of the lessee's costs from the lessor's royalty. Thus, the stated royalty percentage may effectively be significantly less.

B       Biased, slanted lease language. Most standard leases require the lessor to waive any duties implied by law on the lessee (such as duties to act in good faith and to use due diligence to develop the oil and gas resources on the property). Many standard clauses literally state that in the event of any dispute, the lessee's view automatically prevails, leaving the lessor with no recourse.

E       Environmental. Standard leases allow the lessee to dispose of drilling wastes on the property, and store fracking fluids anywhere on the property the lessee might desire. Standard leases do not address avoiding and correcting environmental hazards nor protecting the lessor from claims and liabilities arising from liability hazards created by the lessee. Standard leases contain no or meaningless potable water protections.

D       Depths. The standard lease allows the lessee complete and exclusive rights to all oil and gas on or under the lessor's property, regardless of whether the lessee has any plans or abilities to timely access or explore oil and gas at the various levels.

Any potential lessor should be DISTURBED by the standard drilling company form lease.

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Alan D. Wenger is an attorney in Youngstown, Ohio. His practice areas include oil and gas law, public utilities law, labor and employment law, land use law, environmental law, construction law and school law.