Federal minerals
Checked July 29, 2026 Updated July 29, 2026 6 sources read
Jul 29 2026
The short answer
The United States reserved the minerals under privately owned land across the West through homestead patents issued with a mineral reservation, which is why a surface owner can hold clean title and still have no claim on what is beneath it. How much land that covers is not a figure this site has sourced. This section covers those reservations, how federal minerals are leased, and how federal royalties are paid.
Checked against the sources named below on .
When the United States kept the minerals
This is the reservation people miss, and it is missed because it is not in the county records at all.
A stock-raising homestead patent kept the minerals for the United States
verifiedEvery patent issued under the Stock-Raising Homestead Act reserved all coal and other minerals to the United States, so a surface owner can hold clean title to the land and own none of what is beneath it.
All entries made and patents issued under the provisions of this subchapter shall be subject to and contain a reservation to the United States of all the coal and other minerals in the lands so entered and patented, together with the right to prospect for, mine, and remove the same.
Checked July 29, 2026. Section read in full at uscode.house.gov, which stamps the text as containing those laws in effect on July 28, 2026. This is the reason a county records search can come back clean and still miss the reservation: it happened in the federal patent that first put the land into private hands, not in any later county instrument. The same subsection sets what a mineral developer must do before using the surface, which is the separate rule below.
A federal mineral developer may enter the surface on one of three conditions
verifiedSomeone who has acquired the reserved federal minerals may re-enter and occupy as much of the surface as mining reasonably requires, but only after written consent from the surface owner, or agreed payment for crop and improvement damage, or the posting of a bond running to the United States for the owner's benefit.
may reenter and occupy so much of the surface thereof as may be required for all purposes reasonably incident to the mining or removal of the coal or other minerals, first, upon securing the written consent or waiver of the homestead entryman or patentee; second, upon payment of the damages to crops or other tangible improvements to the owner thereof, where agreement may be had as to the amount thereof; or, third, in lieu of either of the foregoing provisions, upon the execution of a good and sufficient bond or undertaking to the United States for the use and benefit of the entryman or owner of the land
Checked July 29, 2026. Read in the same section at uscode.house.gov. Note the three conditions are alternatives, not cumulative, so a surface owner who refuses consent does not thereby stop the operation: a bond satisfies the statute instead. A person merely prospecting has a separate and lesser obligation in the same subsection, being barred from injuring permanent improvements and made liable to compensate for crop damage. The bond form and approval are left to rules prescribed by the Secretary of the Interior, which were not read here.
How federal minerals are leased, and what they pay
The minimum federal onshore royalty is back to 12.5 percent
verifiedA competitive onshore federal oil and gas lease must pay a royalty of not less than 12.5 percent of the amount or value of production, and a noncompetitive lease pays 12.5 percent. The increase to 16 and two-thirds percent enacted in 2022 was repealed in 2025 and the older, lower rate was restored.
A lease shall be conditioned upon the payment of a royalty at a rate of not less than 12.5 percent in amount or value of the production removed or sold from the lease.
Checked July 29, 2026. Read at uscode.house.gov, text in effect on July 28, 2026. The rate appears twice in the section at 12.5 percent: in subsection (b)(1)(A) for competitive leases, quoted above, and again for a lease issued without competitive bidding. The amendment history is the point. Pub. L. 117-169 (the Inflation Reduction Act) section 50262(a)(1)(B) substituted "16 2/3 percent" for "12 1/2 per centum" wherever appearing on August 16, 2022. The Code's own amendment note records that this substitution "was repealed by Pub. L. 119-21, section 50101(a)(1)". The repealing note, set out under 30 U.S.C. 188, reads: "Subsection (a) of section 50262 of Public Law 117-169 (136 Stat. 2056) is repealed, and any provision of law amended or repealed by that subsection is restored or revived as if that subsection had not been enacted into law." Pub. L. 119-21 was approved July 4, 2025. Any guidance written between August 2022 and mid-2025 that gives 16 and two-thirds percent as the federal royalty rate is describing law that has since been repealed.
Who collects the royalty
One federal office collects the royalty and sends it on
verifiedOffice of Natural Resources Revenue
The Office of Natural Resources Revenue collects, accounts for and verifies energy and mineral revenues from federal and Indian leases, then distributes the money to states, American Indians and the U.S. Treasury.
The Office of Natural Resources Revenue (ONRR - pronounced like "honor") collects, accounts for, and verifies energy and mineral revenues. We then distribute the funds to States, American Indians, and the U.S. Treasury.
Checked July 29, 2026. Quoted from the agency's own home page, read on 2026-07-29. The site is a JavaScript application and returns an empty shell to a plain fetch, so it was read in a browser. The same page reported fiscal year 2026 figures through June of 13.1 billion dollars in revenue and 12.4 billion in disbursements; those are a part-year running total on a page that updates, so they are recorded here as what was observed rather than published as a claim. ONRR also runs the reporting and payment systems a royalty owner deals with, and publishes valuation and pricing references including Indian gas and oil major portion and index zone pricing.
How a royalty owner is taxed
A royalty owner can deduct 15 percent of gross income as depletion
verifiedPercentage depletion is generally unavailable for oil and gas, but a statutory exemption for independent producers and royalty owners restores it at 15 percent, up to a depletable quantity of 1,000 barrels a day averaged over the year.
the allowance for depletion under section 611 shall be computed in accordance with section 613 with respect to- (A) so much of the taxpayer's average daily production of domestic crude oil as does not exceed the taxpayer's depletable oil quantity; and (B) so much of the taxpayer's average daily production of domestic natural gas as does not exceed the taxpayer's depletable natural gas quantity; and 15 percent shall be deemed to be specified in subsection (b) of section 613
Checked July 29, 2026. Read at uscode.house.gov, text in effect on July 28, 2026. Subsection (a) is the general rule that depletion for an oil or gas well is computed without regard to section 613, meaning without percentage depletion; subsection (c), quoted above, is the exemption, and its heading names royalty owners expressly. The depletable oil quantity is a tentative 1,000 barrels reduced by average daily marginal production, and a taxpayer may elect to convert barrels of that quantity into a natural gas quantity at 6,000 cubic feet per barrel. NOT READ HERE: the limitations in subsection (d), including the taxable income limit on the deduction, and how the deduction is reported on a return.
Where the records are
Federal patents are searched in the General Land Office records
verifiedBureau of Land Management, General Land Office Records
The Bureau of Land Management publishes federal land conveyance records for the public land states, with images of more than five million federal land title records issued from 1788 to the present, which is where a patent carrying a mineral reservation is found.
We provide live access to Federal land conveyance records for the Public Land States, including image access to more than five million Federal land title records issued between 1788 and the present.
Checked July 29, 2026. Quoted from the General Land Office Records site's own description, read in a browser on 2026-07-29 because the site is a JavaScript application that returns no readable content to a plain fetch. This is the search that answers whether the original patent reserved the minerals to the United States, which no county grantor and grantee index will tell you. The site also offers a map search and document type browsing. NOT READ HERE: whether coverage is complete for any particular state or county, and how a reservation is identified on the face of a specific patent image.
What has changed, with dates
Each entry is the date the change took effect, not the date we noticed it.
- August 16, 2022. The Inflation Reduction Act raised the minimum royalty on onshore federal oil and gas leases from 12.5 percent to 16 and two-thirds percent, substituting the new figure wherever the old one appeared. 30 U.S.C. § 226
- July 4, 2025. That increase was repealed. Pub. L. 119-21 repealed the Inflation Reduction Act subsection and provided that any provision of law it had amended is restored or revived as if the subsection had never been enacted, which returned the minimum onshore royalty to 12.5 percent and restored noncompetitive leasing. 30 U.S.C. § 188
What this section does not answer yet
Every page here says what it does not answer yet. A reference that never names its own gaps is one you cannot check.
- What royalty rate applies to a lease that was actually issued while the higher 2022 rate was in force. The repeal restores the earlier law as if the increase had never been enacted, which does not on its face say whether an existing lease's own rate changes, and nothing read here settles it. A lessor or lessee with a lease dated between August 2022 and July 2025 should read the lease.
- The regulations under any of these statutes. The royalty valuation rules at 30 CFR Part 1206, which decide what the royalty is actually calculated on, are listed in PROOF_GATE.md section C and have not been read.
- Percentage depletion's limitations in 26 U.S.C. 613A(d), including the taxable income limit, and how the deduction is claimed on a return.
- How the reserved federal minerals under a stock-raising homestead patent are leased in practice, and what notice a surface owner receives before operations begin.
- Whether the General Land Office records are complete for any given state or county, and how a mineral reservation is identified on the face of a particular patent image.
- Tribal and allotted Indian minerals. ONRR collects and distributes revenue for Indian leases and publishes Indian-specific pricing, and none of that framework has been read here. The scope rule for this site reaches tribal minerals only where a federal statute is the operative authority, and that determination has not been made for any of it.
- Offshore federal minerals entirely. Everything above is onshore.
Why this section matters more than its search volume suggests
A reader in the West can do everything right, search the county records, find no private severance, and still not own the minerals, because the reservation happened in the patent that first put the land in private hands. That patent is a federal record, not a county one, and people miss it constantly.
Sources read
- United States Code, Office of the Law Revision Counsel 43 U.S.C. § 299 read July 29, 2026
- United States Code, Office of the Law Revision Counsel 30 U.S.C. § 226 read July 29, 2026
- United States Code, Office of the Law Revision Counsel 30 U.S.C. § 188 read July 29, 2026
- Office of Natural Resources Revenue read July 29, 2026
- United States Code, Office of the Law Revision Counsel 26 U.S.C. § 613A read July 29, 2026
- Bureau of Land Management, General Land Office Records read July 29, 2026