Contingent Liabilities and Commitments

12 Months Ended

Dec. 31, 2019

Commitments and Contingencies Disclosure [Abstract]

Contingent Liabilities

Federal gas royalties

Other producers have been pursuing administrative appeals with a federal regulatory agency and have been in discussions with a state agency in New Mexico regarding certain deductions, comprised primarily of processing, treating and transportation costs, used in the calculation of royalties. Although we are not a party to those matters, we are monitoring them to evaluate whether their resolution might have the potential for unfavorable impact on our results of operations. Certain outstanding issues in those matters could be material to us. We received notice from the U.S. Department of Interior Office of Natural Resources Revenue (“ONRR”) in the fourth quarter of 2010, intending to clarify the guidelines for calculating federal royalties on conventional gas production applicable to many of our federal leases in New Mexico. The guidelines for New Mexico properties were revised slightly in September 2013 as a result of additional work performed by the ONRR. The revisions did not change the basic function of the original guidance. The ONRR’s guidance provides its view as to how much of a producer’s bundled fees for transportation and processing can be deducted from the royalty payment. We believe using these guidelines would not result in a material difference in determining our historical federal royalty payments for our leases in New Mexico. Similar guidelines were subsequently issued for certain leases in Colorado and, as in the case of the New Mexico guidelines, we do not believe that they will result in a material difference to our historical federal royalty payments. ONRR has asked producers to attempt to evaluate the deductibility of these fees directly with the midstream companies that transport and process gas.

Environmental matters

The EPA, other federal agencies, and various state and local regulatory agencies and jurisdictions routinely promulgate and propose new rules, and issue updated guidance to existing rules. These new rules and rulemakings include, but are not limited to, new air quality standards for ground level ozone, methane, green completions, and hydraulic fracturing and water standards. We are unable to estimate the costs of asset additions or modifications necessary to comply with these new regulations due to uncertainty created by the various legal challenges to these regulations and the need for further specific regulatory guidance.

Matters related to Williams’ former power business

In connection with a Separation and Distribution Agreement between WPX and Williams, Williams is obligated to indemnify and hold us harmless from any losses arising out of liabilities assumed by us for the pending litigation described below relating to the reporting of certain natural gas-related information to trade publications.

Civil suits based on allegations of manipulating published gas price indices have been brought against us and others, seeking unspecified amounts of damages. We are currently a defendant in class action litigation and other litigation originally filed in state court in Colorado, Kansas, Missouri and Wisconsin and brought on behalf of direct and indirect purchasers of natural gas in those states. These cases were transferred to the federal court in Nevada. In 2008, the court granted summary

judgment in the Colorado case in favor of us and most of the other defendants based on plaintiffs’ lack of standing. On January 8, 2009, the court denied the plaintiffs’ request for reconsideration of the Colorado dismissal and entered judgment in our favor. On August 6, 2018, the Ninth Circuit reversed the orders denying class certification and remanded to the MDL Court. On September 7, 2018, those plaintiffs filed a motion seeking remand to the originally filed district courts of Missouri, Kansas and Wisconsin. In February, 2019, settlement agreements with the Kansas and Missouri class claimants were executed, and on August 5, 2019, after the final fairness hearing, the court approved the settlement and entered final judgment. In the Wisconsin putative class action, the case was remanded to its originally filed court of the Western District of Wisconsin for trial.

In the other cases, on July 18, 2011, the Nevada district court granted our joint motions for summary judgment to preclude the plaintiffs’ state law claims because the federal Natural Gas Act gives the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission exclusive jurisdiction to resolve those issues. The court also denied the plaintiffs’ class certification motion as moot. The plaintiffs appealed to the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. On April 10, 2013, the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit issued its opinion in the In re: Western States Wholesale Antitrust Litigation, holding that the Natural Gas Act does not preempt the plaintiffs’ state antitrust claims and reversing the summary judgment previously entered in favor of the defendants. The U.S. Supreme Court granted Defendants’ writ of certiorari. On April 21, 2015, the U.S. Supreme Court determined that the state antitrust claims are not preempted by the federal Natural Gas Act. On March 7, 2016, the putative class plaintiffs in several of the cases filed their motions for class certification. On March 30, 2017, the court denied the motions for class certification, which decision was appealed on June 20, 2017. On May 24, 2016, in Reorganized FLI Inc. v. Williams Companies, Inc., the Court granted Defendants’ Motion for Summary Judgment in its entirety, and an agreed amended judgment was entered by the court on January 4, 2017. Reorganized FLI, Inc. appealed this decision and on March 27, 2018, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals reversed and remanded the case to the MDL Court. In May 2019, the MDL Court remanded the case back to Kansas District Court. On December 30, 2019, Defendants petitioned the United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit to consider their motion for appeal of their motion to reconsider the denial of their motion for summary judgement. Because of the uncertainty around pending unresolved issues, including an insufficient description of the purported classes and other related matters, we cannot reasonably estimate a range of potential exposure at this time.

Other Indemnifications

Pursuant to various purchase and sale agreements relating to divested businesses and assets, including the agreements pursuant to which we divested our Piceance and San Juan Basin operations, we have indemnified certain purchasers against liabilities that they may incur with respect to the businesses and assets acquired from us. The indemnities provided to the purchasers are customary in sale transactions and are contingent upon the purchasers incurring liabilities that are not otherwise recoverable from third parties. The indemnities generally relate to breaches of representations and warranties, tax liabilities, historic litigation, personal injury, environmental matters and rights-of-way. Additionally, Federal and state laws in areas of former operations may require previous operators to perform in certain circumstances where the buyer/operator may no longer be able to perform. Such duties may include plugging and abandoning wells or responsibility for surface agreements in existence at the time of disposition.

The current owner/operator of properties we divested in the Powder River Basin filed for bankruptcy during the fourth quarter of 2019, and it is uncertain to what extent the current owner/operator will perform its obligations with respect to such properties. Prior to our disposition of such properties, payments under the surface use agreements were approximately $6 million annually and our recorded asset retirement obligation under GAAP related to the plugging and abandoning of wells was approximately $46 million.

The indemnity provided to the purchaser of the entity that held our Piceance Basin operations relates in substantial part to liabilities arising in connection with litigation over the appropriate calculation of royalty payments. Plaintiffs in that litigation have asserted claims regarding, among other things, the method by which we accounted for transportation costs when calculating royalty payments. In 2017, we settled one of these claims.

As of December 31, 2019, we have not received any additional significant claims against any of these indemnities and thus have no basis from which to estimate any reasonably possible loss beyond any amount already accrued. Further, we do not expect any of the indemnities provided pursuant to the sales agreements to have a material impact on our future financial position. However, if a claim for indemnity is brought against us in the future, it may have a material adverse effect on our results of operations in the period in which the claim is made.

In connection with the separation from Williams, we agreed to indemnify and hold Williams harmless from any losses resulting from the operation of our business or arising out of liabilities assumed by us. Similarly, Williams has agreed to indemnify and hold us harmless from any losses resulting from the operation of its business or arising out of liabilities assumed by it.

Summary

As of December 31, 2019 and December 31, 2018, the Company had accrued approximately $10 million and $11 million, respectively, for loss contingencies associated with royalty litigation and other contingencies. In certain circumstances, we may be eligible for insurance recoveries, or reimbursement from others. Any such recoveries or reimbursements will be recognized only when realizable.

Management, including internal counsel, currently believes that the ultimate resolution of the foregoing matters, taken as a whole and after consideration of amounts accrued, insurance coverage, recovery from customers or other indemnification arrangements, is not expected to have a materially adverse effect upon our future liquidity or financial position; however, it could be material to our results of operations in any given year.

Commitments

We have minimum commitments with midstream companies for gathering, treating, processing and transportation services associated with moving certain of our production to market. As part of managing our commodity price risk, we may also utilize contracted pipeline capacity to move our oil and natural gas production and third-party purchases of oil and natural gas to other locations in an attempt to obtain more favorable pricing differentials. The midstream service and transportation contract commitments disclosed below include obligations for which liabilities were recorded in 2015 associated with our exit from the Powder River Basin and our abandonment of an area in the Appalachian Basin. As of December 31, 2019, commitments and recorded liabilities associated with our midstream service and transportation contracts are as follows:


	Midstream Services		Transportation		Total
	(Millions)
2020	$	53	$	114	$	167
2021	48		94		142
2022	43		87		130
2023	40		75		115
2024	36		76		112
Thereafter	32		315		347
Total commitments	$	252	$	761	$	1,013

Accrued liabilities	$	15	$	21	$	36

Our midstream service commitments will be settled over approximately seven years.

Total rent expense, excluding amounts capitalized, was $25 million and $19 million in 2018 and 2017, respectively. Rent charges incurred for drilling rig rentals are capitalized under the successful efforts method of accounting; however, charges for rig release penalties or long term standby charges are expensed as incurred.