Baker Botts: A Full-Service Global Energy Law Firm

Introduction

Wherever significant energy is produced in the United States and around the world, Baker Botts lawyers are plugged in, helping clients with high-profile transactions, litigating high-stakes cases and providing counsel on intricate regulatory matters.

For more than a century, our Energy Team has represented a wide variety of clients in the energy industry, from nearly all of the dominant domestic and international oil and gas operators, service companies and pipelines to numerous regional and independent producers, processors, transporters, distributors and marketers.

Our Energy Lawyers have significant experience working with clients in the upstream, midstream and downstream markets for virtually all forms of energy, including:

• Oil and gas
• Liquid natural gas
• Mining and metals
• Power
• Renewables, including solar and wind
• Hydrogen

Our reach is global: we have advised on matters in more than 120 countries and energy hubs such as Africa, China, Europe, Russia, the Middle East and South America.

In the United States, we handle substantial engagements in established and emerging major shale plays, including Eagle Ford, Bakken, Permian, Utica, Barnett and Marcellus. Our lawyers also routinely handle deals and disputes related to offshore oil and gas drilling and development.

The Energy Practice at Baker Botts serves clients in three main areas:

Transactions:

Our team regularly handles public and private deals across the energy value chain, structuring and documenting complex joint ventures, investments and financings, and acquisitions and divestitures.

Litigation:

We have particular strength in litigating oil and gas matters across the country, including many of the most important and ground-breaking cases arising from issues involving gas flaring, railcar accidents, title disputes, nuisance claims and local fracking bans. Our dedicated team of trial lawyers also has significant experience with claims for damages to natural resources under CERCLA.

Regulatory:

We routinely appear before the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), the U.S. Department of the Interior and various state agencies and commissions across the United States, as well as before federal and state appeals courts, to challenge agency actions and rulings on behalf of our clients. Our lawyers have also handled numerous oil and gas pipeline rate matters before FERC and state utilities commissions, along with representing clients before the Interior Department in royalty cases arising from federal oil and gas leases.

Oil and Gas

Baker Botts’ Oil and Gas Practice offers the full range of legal and business services backed by more than 100 years of experience handling oil and gas matters in over 70 nations, including upstream, midstream and downstream and including mergers, acquisitions, divestitures, joint ventures, unitizations, project design, development and operations, financings, investments, environmental and regulatory matters, litigation, arbitration, intellectual property matters and tax structuring.

The firm is frequently called upon to analyse and assess international and local law considerations and help structure and document complex, challenging or novel cross border energy transactions and projects, as well as defend the interests of clients involved in these matters should a dispute arise.

Baker Botts is one of the most distinguished oil and gas firms in the world with a seasoned team of oil and gas lawyers who have represented virtually all types of oil and gas project and transactional participants in both U.S. and international markets. Our team can provide clients with the mature counsel needed to help with critical business decisions involving the political, economic and legal complexities inherent in the development or protection of our clients’ interests.

Projects

The Global Projects team at Baker Botts is composed of lawyers skilled in various complementary practices that offer clients the range of legal skills and experience needed for sophisticated and complex energy and infrastructure projects and transactions around the world.

The Global Projects group includes:

• Our energy projects practice (representing sponsors in the development of upstream oil and gas, LNG, pipeline, petrochemical, refinery, hydrogen, electric power, and renewable energy projects, as well as in the acquisition and divestiture of interests in such projects).
• Our project finance practice (representing both sponsors and lenders on energy and infrastructure projects).
• Our energy regulatory practice (representing regulated entities; investors and customers/ratepayers of regulated entities, including electric generation, transmission, and distribution; and LNG and natural gas production, gathering, transportation and distribution companies on U.S. federal and state regulatory and permitting issues).
• Our real estate practice (representing developers and lenders on real estate projects, and acquisitions and divestitures of interests in such projects).
• Our international trade practice (representing clients in matters involving U.S. federal regulation of exports, imports, overseas investment, and financial transactions).

Our clients and our clients’ business interests are all over the world, and so are we. Our work has taken us to virtually every continent, and many of our lawyers have unparalleled regional experience. Lawyers from the global projects group are based in each of the firm’s offices, and many of our lawyers spend significant time in regions other than where they are based in order to meet the inbound and outbound business interests and needs of our clients.

Project Finance

Baker Botts has a long history representing various participants in the development and financing of capital-intensive projects throughout the world. With our industry experience, global reach and local understanding, we can provide comprehensive legal support in structuring energy and infrastructure financings of any nature. Our experience extends to all segments of the energy and infrastructure sectors, including:

• Oil and gas exploration and development projects
• Floating production storage and off-loading (FPSOs) and transportation systems
• Drilling rigs and vessels
• Oil and gas pipelines and processing facilities
• Hydrogen energy projects
• LNG export and import terminals
• Refineries
• Petrochemical facilities
• Wind, solar, biomass, landfill gas and other alternative energy projects
• Conventional power generation and transmission
• Toll roads, airports and seaports
• Water treatment facilities
• Telecommunications projects

The breadth and depth of our project finance experience allow us to craft innovative solutions designed to achieve each client’s commercial objectives and risk-allocation preferences.

Finance Team

We have a strong team of recognized project finance lawyers across our global network of offices that provide services under U.S. and English law. In addition, Baker Botts lawyers have taken part in a variety of Islamic financing transactions in recent years involving several Shari’a compliant structures, including ijara (lease), murabaha (sale with mark-up) and mudaraba (partnership with advisor).

Our financing resume includes syndicated loan facilities for both greenfield projects and acquisitions, reserve-based facilities, cross-border and synthetic leasing, maritime financings, public and private debt capital market financings, securitizations, and swaps, hedges and other commodity products, whether full or limited recourse or on- or off-balance sheet. Baker Botts is also one of the pioneers and market leaders in transactions involving master limited partnerships (MLPs) and YieldCos. Many of these financings have entailed cutting-edge structures.

Project Development Experience

Our lawyers have extensive experience in structuring, drafting and negotiating various types of project agreements, such as:

• Concessions, licenses, treaties and other
• Governmental agreements
• Engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contracts
• Fuel supply agreements
• Lifting agreements
• LNG sales and purchase agreements
• Operation and maintenance agreements
• Power purchase, tolling and power marketing agreements
• Terminal use agreements
• Transportation agreements

Our deep market knowledge enables us to provide creative solutions and give our clients contractual protection in the context of a specific project. Our lawyers are trained to anticipate issues, identify risks and solve problems in both project development and project finance contexts, so that the project agreements properly allocate risks and support a favourable financing.

For further advice and assistance please contact:

Baker Botts (UK) LLP
Level 30
20 Fenchurch Street
London
EC3M 3BY
Tel: +44 (0)20 7726 3420
Contact: Adam Leviton
Email: adam.leviton@bakerbotts.com
Website: www.bakerbotts.com