Michael B.
Donald

Position: Partner
Office: Houston

Michael Donald is a partner in the Litigation Practice Group. He represents energy and natural resources companies in a broad range of disputes.

Michael serves clients in the oil and gas, natural gas transmission, transportation, electric utilities, and mining industries. He has served multiple exploration and production clients as counsel on commercial disputes concerning every phase in the development of unconventional resource (shale) plays. He has also served as project counsel for several interstate and intrastate pipeline and storage projects that involved salt dome and depleted reservoir matters and as trial counsel on condemnation/expropriation litigation in Texas and Louisiana.

As a go-to litigator for a number of well-known multinational, national, and regional corporations across the energy spectrum, Michael has specific experience with matters involving payment of royalty and allocation of post-production costs, as well as lessor and working interest disputes concerning lease maintenance, implied obligations, and cost allocation. He also has extensive experience with eminent domain matters involving interstate and intrastate matters in Arizona, Louisiana, New Mexico, Texas, and other jurisdictions.

Recently, Michael advised natural gas suppliers involved in the development of new and refurbished, multibillion-dollar liquified natural gas (LNG) facilities in South Texas and Louisiana. Working proactively with his clients, he has advised on onshore and offshore pipeline siting, eminent domain, environmental permitting, carbon sequestration, environmental justice, and other issues, helping ensure compliance with federal and state regulations and establishing a regulatory record that can withstand judicial scrutiny. Michael has also assembled teams of right-of-way agents and developed and delivered in-house training sessions to standardize the negotiation and closing of easement and other agreements.

At every step, Michael helps clients identify potential issues, mitigate risks, and ensure that projects remain on schedule and meet go-live dates. By avoiding such delays, his clients are able to meet cost projections, minimize negative effects on stock prices, and fulfill agreements with project partners and investors.

Michael is a recognized authority on the legal and regulatory issues surrounding carbon sequestration and related technologies. He authored Act 512, which established the Louisiana Geologic Sequestration of Carbon Dioxide Act (La. R.S. 30:1101 et seq.) and was signed into law July 10, 2009. On behalf of American Electric Power, he has testified in support of the act before the House and Senate natural resources committees. Michael also served as Texas counsel for Denbury’s Green Line, a carbon dioxide transmission line from the Jackson Dome in Mississippi to the Hastings Field south of Houston used for secondary oil recovery and eventual sequestration.

Among other publications, Michael authored the chapter in the Louisiana Treatise on Mineral Law concerning Mineral Code art. 122 and implied covenants in mineral leases. He is a longtime member of the Louisiana Mineral Law Institute and is also active in The Foundation (formerly the Rocky Mountain Mineral Law Foundation), serving on its Programs Committee. Michael also speaks frequently to industry associations, economic development groups, and other organizations on various issues concerning the energy industry, including the future of carbon sequestration in Louisiana, Texas, and other jurisdictions across the United States.

Michael has broad experience in environmental litigation involving private cost recovery and citizen action suits, subsurface trespass, groundwater contamination, migration of hazardous chemicals, property value diminution, environmental audit supervision, and risk-based corrective actions. His experience includes serving as trial counsel in environmental litigation cases involving jurisdictional, Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality, and Environmental Protection Agency enforcement. Michael also has represented clients before the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) on a number of issues.

Prior to joining Jones Walker, Michael served as a law clerk to the Honorable Donald E. Walter of the US District Court for the Western District of Louisiana.