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Other Long-Term Obligations and Commitments
9 Months Ended
Sep. 30, 2014
Text Block [Abstract]  
Other Long-Term Obligations and Commitments

(7) Other Long-Term Obligations and Commitments:

Operating Leases:

The Company has several non-cancelable operating leases, primarily for rental of office space, that have a term of more than one year. The future minimum lease payments for the rest of fiscal 2014 and thereafter for the operating leases are as follows:

 

(Thousands of dollars)    Operating
Leases
 

2014

   $ 188   

2015

     651   

2016

     545   

2017

     46   
  

 

 

 

Total minimum payments

   $ 1,430   
  

 

 

 

Rent expense for office space for the nine months ended September 30, 2014 and 2013 was $579,000 and $548,000, respectively.

Asset Retirement Obligation:

A reconciliation of the liability for plugging and abandonment costs for the nine months ended September 30, 2014 is as follows:

 

(Thousands of dollars)       

Asset retirement obligation – December 31, 2013

   $ 10,537   

Liabilities incurred

     1,579   

Liabilities settled

     (642

Gain on settlement of liabilities

     (1,787

Accretion expense

     275   

Revisions in estimated liabilities

     —     
  

 

 

 

Asset retirement obligation – September 30, 2014

   $ 9,962   
  

 

 

 

The Company’s liability is determined using significant assumptions, including current estimates of plugging and abandonment costs, annual inflation of these costs, the productive life of wells and a risk-adjusted interest rate. Changes in any of these assumptions can result in significant revisions to the estimated asset retirement obligation. Revisions to the asset retirement obligation are recorded with an offsetting change to producing properties, resulting in prospective changes to depreciation, depletion and amortization expense and accretion of discount. Because of the subjectivity of assumptions and the relatively long life of most of the Company’s wells, the costs to ultimately retire the wells may vary significantly from previous estimates. In 2014, the Company recognized a gain on the settlement of asset retirement obligations associated with insurance recoveries related to obligations previously recognized on the plugging and abandonment of a well.