By: Sims S.B. No. 172 A BILL TO BE ENTITLED AN ACT 1-1 relating to pipeline easements. 1-2 BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS: 1-3 SECTION 1. Subchapter B, Chapter 111, Natural Resources 1-4 Code, is amended by adding Section 111.0194 to read as follows: 1-5 Sec. 111.0194. PIPELINE EASEMENTS. (a) Unless the terms of 1-6 the grant or the condemnation judgment expressly provide otherwise, 1-7 or the easement rights otherwise prescriptively owned through 1-8 actual use are greater, an easement created through grant or 1-9 through the power of eminent domain for the benefit of a single 1-10 common carrier pipeline for which the power of eminent domain is 1-11 available under Section 111.019 of this code as of the effective 1-12 date of this section is presumed to create an easement in favor of 1-13 the common carrier pipeline, or a successor in interest to the 1-14 common carrier pipeline, that extends only a width of 60 feet as to 1-15 each pipeline laid under the grant or judgment in eminent domain 1-16 prior to September 1, 1993. 1-17 (b) The presumption in Subsection (a) of this section is not 1-18 applicable to pipeline easements of a common carrier pipeline 1-19 granted under the terms of an oil and gas lease or oil, gas, and 1-20 mineral lease, or to any easement which authorizes the construction 1-21 of gathering lines. 1-22 (c) The presumption set out in Subsection (a) of this 1-23 section on the limitation of width may be rebutted by evidence on 1-24 behalf of the common carrier pipeline that a greater width is 2-1 reasonably needed for purposes of operation, construction of 2-2 additional lines under the grant or judgment in an eminent domain 2-3 proceeding, maintenance, repair, replacement, safety, surveillance, 2-4 or as a buffer zone for protection of the safe operation of the 2-5 common carrier pipeline, together with such other evidence as a 2-6 court may deem relevant to establish the extent of an easement in 2-7 excess of 60 feet in width. 2-8 (d) The presumption in Subsection (a) of this section shall 2-9 apply separately as to each pipeline under a grant or judgment 2-10 which allows more than one pipeline on the subservient estate. 2-11 (e) This section shall not be deemed to limit any rights of 2-12 ingress to or egress from easements that may exist under the 2-13 original grant, prescriptive rights, or common law. 2-14 SECTION 2. The importance of this legislation and the 2-15 crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an 2-16 emergency and an imperative public necessity that the 2-17 constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several 2-18 days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended, 2-19 and that this Act take effect and be in force from and after its 2-20 passage, and it is so enacted.