The following words and terms, when used in this chapter, shall have the following meanings, unless the context clearly indicates otherwise.

1. (1) Commissioner--Commissioner of the General Land Office.
2. (2) Counterparts--Instruments executed by different parties and recorded as separate instruments or fully executed instruments recorded in different counties.
3. (3) Exploration--Geological, geophysical, geochemical, and other surveys and investigations conducted for the purposes of discovering and locating oil and gas.
4. (4) GLO--General Land Office.
5. (5) GLO lease number--The identification assigned by GLO to each lease filed in the GLO mineral files, usually the same as the mineral file number, but sometimes different, as with undivided interest leases.
6. (6) Land trade lands--Lands, the surface of which have been sold or traded, with mineral and leasing rights retained by the state.
7. (7) Lessee--The initial holder of the leasehold interest or a successor, assignee, devisee, heir, or any other person who acquires that interest.
8. (8) Mineral file number--The identification assigned by GLO to the GLO jacket in which lease records are kept.
9. (9) Oil and gas--Crude oil, natural gas, and associated hydrocarbons, including, without limitation, casinghead gas, condensate, distillate, and liquids extracted from natural gas.
10. (10) Operator--The person primarily responsible for exploring for, developing, or producing oil and gas from a particular lease, field, or area; also any employee, agent, servant, contractor, subcontractor, trustee, or receiver of an operator, or any other agent in control of any or all of the leasehold interest.
11. (11) Person--Any individual, partnership, corporation, association, or other legal entity.
12. (12) Premises--Any state property subject to a lease.
13. (13) PSF--Permanent School Fund.
14. (14) PUF--Public University Fund.
15. (15) Relinquishment Act lands--Any public free school or asylum lands, whether surveyed or unsurveyed, sold with a mineral classification or reservation between September 1, 1895, and August 21, 1931, encompassing any other lands, including vacancy lands, patented with all minerals reserved to the state and expressly made subject to the leasing terms and procedures governing Relinquishment Act lands.
16. (16) Relinquishment Act leases--Leases issued under the Texas Natural Resources Code, Chapter 52, Subchapter F, and §9.5(4) of this title (relating to Leasing State Property for Oil and Gas).
17. (17) RRC--Texas Railroad Commission.
18. (18) SLB--School Land Board.
19. (19) Submerged lands--Islands, salt water lakes, bays, inlets, marshes, and reefs within tidewater limits and that portion of the Gulf of Mexico within the jurisdiction of the State of Texas.
20. (20) TDC--Texas Department of Corrections.
21. (21) TPWD--Texas Parks and Wildlife Department.

Source Note:The provisions of this §9.1 adopted to be effective September 29, 1989, 14 TexReg 4691.