Dear Ms Hefner,
In my opinion…
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Nope. What we are taking about is “bright line” language by adding the “on” and it does not in and of itself change the four corners of the document.
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Nope. You do not have to sign. But I will tell you why you are being hounded to execute the ratification. It is not to confirm your royalty interest. It is to allow your royalty interest to be diluted by the pooling provision of the lease that you are ratifying. If the bottom hole or horizontal drainhole is on the lands where your royalty interest is located and you do not allow pooling, you receive an undliluted1/2 of the landowners royalty. Having said that, you have to make a decision as to whether you want your royalty percentage diluted. There are many cases where oil wells have NOT been drilled because of situations where the royalty owner did not want to dilute their royalty, which the net effect was that the burdens were so high that exploration was not profitable. However, if your lands are not the drillsite, then you would not get any revenue unless you ratified the lease or the pooling document.
I think that you need to get a professional involved so that all relevant information can be obtained and you can get some good advice. I would not recommend a do-it-yourself approach in this case.