Energy companies face widening stakeholder expectations focused on the concept of sustainable development of the world’s energy resources. These widening expectations in three critical performance areas—profitability, social responsibility and environmental stewardship—have shaped many of the business disputes in which Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld LLP has been involved in support of our energy clients.
Our lawyers have gained a thorough understanding of the oil and gas industry that spans all phases of the business, from exploration and production to transportation, refining and marketing. They have similar knowledge of the electricity industry, having represented generators, transmission companies and local service providers.
We have represented oil and gas companies in antitrust claims, asbestos and benzene exposure, class actions, oilfield and refinery accidents, operating agreement disputes, production accounting disputes, refinery outage and business interruption issues, and royalty and state tax issues.
In the power sector, we have represented clients in billing disputes (industrial and commercial customers), co-owner and joint-venture disputes, environmental matters, fuel-supply matters (including transportation and mining issues), limitation and liability issues, outage and business interruption claims, nuclear power issues, power plant and co-generation facility construction, rates and tariffs, and warranty and insurance claims.
In each of these representations, our energy litigators work closely with hundreds of colleagues in the firm’s litigation practice who focus their dispute resolution skills specifically on—
Like all of the firm’s litigation practices, our energy industry litigators regularly call upon the use of knowledge management (KM) resources. Our litigators regularly turn to a highly vetted repository of exemplar briefs, motions and research to call upon the knowledge and experience of the entire firm. The result is efficient and consistent handling of procedural matters and an increased ability to focus not on “reinventing the wheel” but in developing innovative legal theories to advance our clients’ goals. Other KM resources include a database of judges and mediators to facilitate our internal awareness of judicial preferences, and search tools that instantly locate Akin Gump’s analysis of thousands of cases and statutes.
In Akin Gump’s view, the key to litigation success is to have the creativity to knock out claims at the earliest possible stage, to have the flexibility to reach advantageous settlements, where appropriate, and to have the experience and talent to take cases to trial, if necessary—and win.