Accrued Expenses

12 Months Ended

Dec. 31, 2021

NOTE I – ACCRUED EXPENSES

Accrued expenses consist of the following:


	2021		2020
Compensation and incentives	$	1,655,761	$	1,136,754
Professional services		1,475,522		243,995
Deposit		450,000		450,000
Interest		21,875,753		18,002,386
Accrued insurance obligations		621,770		355,814
Other operating		1,765,301		985,056

Total accrued expenses	$	27,844,107	$	21,174,005

Professional fees are mainly attributable to legal fees and other professional services in support of operations and the NAFTA litigation. Compensation and incentives at December 31, 2021 includes $0.9 million accrued incentive awards for the company employees at December 31, 2020 and prior and $0.7

million additional for 2021. Payment of the incentives is subject to Board approval. Other operating at December 31, 2021 contains general expense items resulting from general operations. The primary expense in Other operating is

$1.8 million for exploration permits. Accrued interest is due to several lenders per debt agreements described in NOTE H. During the quarter ended September 30, 2019, we received an earnest money deposit of $450,000 from a company controlled by Greg Stemm, our past Chairman of the Board (see NOTE J for further information). The earnest money deposit relates to a draft agreement related to potential sale of a stake of our equity in CIC. This transaction has not yet been consummated. Accrued insurance obligations for the years ended December 31, 2021 and 2020 primarily consisted of directors and officers insurance obligations.