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A U.S. judge formally approved Peabody Energy Corp.’s plan to emerge from bankruptcy on Friday after the coal producer struck a settlement with the U.S. government over legacy environmental claims at a gold and metal mining subsidiary, Reuters reported yesterday. Under a last-minute deal with the U.S. Department of Justice, Peabody agreed to create a $43 million trust to manage environmental liabilities stemming from its dormant Gold Fields Mining subsidiary, according to court papers. St. Louis-based Peabody, the world's largest private-sector coal producer, owns mines in Australia and the United States and supplies the global market with the metallurgical coal used in steelmaking and the thermal coal used to generate electricity. Peabody expects to exit bankruptcy in early April with about $2 billion of debt amid dramatically improved short-term prospects for its business versus a year ago, when it sought chapter 11 protection with more than $8 billion of debt. In the environmental settlement, the Department of Justice was negotiating on behalf of the Environmental Protection Agency, the Interior Department, five states and seven Indian tribes. The parties filed claims worth billions of dollars, which Peabody disputed but said that it agreed to settle to avoid drawn-out litigation. Peabody agreed earlier in March to cover about $1 billion in future coal mine cleanup costs with third-party bonds.

A judge has approved Chaparral Energy Inc.'s plan to exit bankruptcy, wiping out $1.2 billion in debt from the Oklahoma City-based company, the Tulsa (Okla.) World reported today. Chaparral, a company of nearly 350 employees, expects to emerge from bankruptcy by the end of March, the company said yesterday. Under the plan, Chaparral's unsecured bondholders and general unsecured creditors will own all of the company's ownership interest, subject to some dilution. "Thanks to the hard work of everyone involved with this process, Chaparral will emerge from chapter 11 within the next few weeks as one of the most financially stable oil and gas companies of its size in the industry," CEO K. Earl Reynolds said. Read more. 

The featured keynote at ABI's 2017 Annual Spring Meeting will be Spencer Abraham, former U.S. Senator and former U.S. Secretary of Energy. Additionally, a panel at the Annual Spring Meeting will be discussing legal and business developments in E&P cases. Click here to register! 

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