American Mineral RegistryResearch & data

State law reference

Do Mineral Rights Expire in Washington, D.C.?

Do mineral rights expire in Washington, D.C.? The D.C. Code has no provision on severed mineral interests, so nothing makes them lapse for nonuse or bars them under a marketable title act. General land law, such as the 15 year limit on actions to recover land (§ 12-301(1)) and the action to perfect title acquired by adverse possession (§ 16-3301), is not mineral specific.

  • Release 2026.10.1
  • Reviewed October 1, 2026
  • CC BY 4.0

No statute found Researched and checked by American Mineral Registry by searching the text it could read, which turned up no statute on this point; review completed October 1, 2026. Reference research, not legal advice.

Rule type
No such statute found
Period
None
Ends without a surface owner step
Not applicable
Preservation filing
Not applicable
Forced pooling statute
No statute found
Surface damages statute
No statute found
Deceased or unlocated owner
Checked
Do Mineral Rights Expire in Washington, D.C.?: map of the 51 U.S. jurisdictions with D.C. marked and the 17 others that share its rule type, no such statute found shaded
D.C. is one of 18 jurisdictions that had no statute of these kinds in AMR’s search of the official code. Every jurisdiction’s rule type is on Mineral Rights by State.

How the rule works

No dormant mineral or marketable title statute identified. The D.C. Code has no provision on severed mineral interests, so nothing makes them lapse for nonuse or bars them under a marketable title act. General land law, such as the 15 year limit on actions to recover land (§ 12-301(1)) and the action to perfect title acquired by adverse possession (§ 16-3301), is not mineral specific.

Scope

Interests covered
Not applicable; no mechanism identified.
Minerals covered
Not applicable.
Enactment and amendments
No dormancy statute identified in the D.C. Code as codified through the September 30, 2026 publication.
What AMR searched
Full text search of every section of the codified D.C. Code in the Council's own XML (github.com/DCCouncil/law-xml-codified, branch publication/May 23, 2026.September 30, 2026, the data behind code.dccouncil.gov) for mineral interest, mineral right, mineral estate, severed mineral, oil and gas interest, lease or right, dormant mineral, marketable title, marketable record title, forced or compulsory pooling, spacing unit and surface owner. The only hit was § 47-1384, in the real property tax sale chapter. The word mineral appears in 31 sections, all UCC, trust principal and income, conservatorship, health or environmental definitions.

What “none found” means. AMR searched the official code for a dormant mineral, abandonment, lapse or forfeiture statute and found none. That does not mean a mineral interest can never be lost: deeds, title defects, tax sales, adverse possession and other rules can still affect ownership, and they are outside this review.

Dates and what they mean

There is no statutory nonuse period to calculate for this jurisdiction under the rules AMR reviewed.

No lapse mechanism found, so there is no date to compute.

Deceased or unlocated owner

Checked What the law of District of Columbia says when the owner of record has died, is unknown, or cannot be found. It sets out the questions; it does not decide who owns an interest, whether a notice was valid, or whether an interest ended.

The D.C. Code contains no provision on severed mineral interests and nothing on deceased, unknown or unlocated mineral owners. The only mineral related owner rule found is in the unclaimed property act, which treats unpaid mineral proceeds as property it covers; that concerns payments, not title. General probate, quiet title and partition law may apply and was not reviewed.

Owner of record has died
Not addressed in the provisions read.
Current owner unknown
Not addressed in the provisions read.
Owner known but cannot be found
Not addressed in the provisions read.

How the nonuse rule treats these owners Not addressed in the provisions read

No dormancy, nonuse, statement of claim or marketable title provision for severed minerals was found in the D.C. Code searched, so no mechanism treats deceased, unknown or unlocated owners.

Heirs, devisees and successors Not addressed in the provisions read

No mineral specific provision on heirs, devisees, successors or the identity of the holder was found. Probate, heirship, quiet title, partition and receivership procedures of general application may apply and were not reviewed.

Search required to find the owner Not addressed in the provisions read

No mineral specific search or diligence requirement was found.

Who gets notice, and how Not addressed in the provisions read

No mineral specific notice requirement to owners was found.

Notice by publication Not addressed in the provisions read

No mineral specific publication rule was found.

How the owner responds or preserves Not addressed in the provisions read

No preservation or response procedure for mineral owners was found, because no lapse mechanism exists in the provisions read.

Court, receivership or trust for missing owners Statute

No mechanism for the mineral interest itself. The Revised Uniform Unclaimed Property Act covers 'mineral proceeds' (41-151.02(18)), and 41-163.02(b) voids locator agreements over mineral proceeds not yet presumed abandoned; these govern payments only.

Statute

  1. The District's unclaimed property act defines mineral proceeds as amounts payable for extraction, production or sale of minerals. D.C. Code 41-151.02(18) Council of the District of Columbia, D.C. Law Library. Read October 6, 2026. Source ID SRC-DC-002.

    “"Mineral proceeds" means an amount payable for extraction, production, or sale of minerals, or, on the abandonment of the amount, an amount that becomes payable after abandonment.”

    Scope: Revised Uniform Unclaimed Property Act. Reaches payments owed to an apparent owner, not ownership of any mineral interest; presumption periods and claim procedures were not read. Read from the Council's codified XML, branch publication/May 23, 2026.October 2, 2026.

What a title review must establish

  1. Are any mineral proceeds attributable to the owner held by the unclaimed property administrator (special_mechanism)?

Dates. No owner status period for mineral interests was found. Unclaimed property presumption periods were not read. The rule finder does not calculate this period.

What AMR searched. All 24,188 section files of the codified D.C. Code in the Council's own XML (github.com/DCCouncil/law-xml-codified, branch publication/May 23, 2026.October 2, 2026, the data behind code.dccouncil.gov) searched for mineral interest, right, estate or lease, oil and gas lease, interest or right, severed mineral, mineral proceeds, royalty owner or interest, unlocated and cannot be located. Hits: 21-2011, 28:9-320 comment, 31-5601.01, 41-151.02 and 41-163.02. No case law search, since there is no mineral statute to interpret. A point marked not addressed means only that the provisions read do not address it; probate, quiet title and other general procedures may still apply and were not reviewed.

Checked October 6, 2026. Also in the dormant mineral rule finder.

Forced pooling

No statute found The D.C. Code has no oil and gas conservation, spacing or pooling provision.

Searched: Full text search of every section of the codified D.C. Code in the Council's own XML (github.com/DCCouncil/law-xml-codified, branch publication/May 23, 2026.September 30, 2026, the data behind code.dccouncil.gov) for mineral interest, mineral right, mineral estate, severed mineral, oil and gas interest, lease or right, dormant mineral, marketable title, marketable record title, forced or compulsory pooling, spacing unit and surface owner. The only hit was § 47-1384, in the real property tax sale chapter. The word mineral appears in 31 sections, all UCC, trust principal and income, conservatorship, health or environmental definitions.

Surface damages

No statute found The D.C. Code has no surface damages or split estate provision.

Searched: Full text search of every section of the codified D.C. Code in the Council's own XML (github.com/DCCouncil/law-xml-codified, branch publication/May 23, 2026.September 30, 2026, the data behind code.dccouncil.gov) for mineral interest, mineral right, mineral estate, severed mineral, oil and gas interest, lease or right, dormant mineral, marketable title, marketable record title, forced or compulsory pooling, spacing unit and surface owner. The only hit was § 47-1384, in the real property tax sale chapter. The word mineral appears in 31 sections, all UCC, trust principal and income, conservatorship, health or environmental definitions.

Taxes

Broad personal income tax: yes. DC imposes its income tax on the taxable income of every resident, and the Home Rule Act bars the DC Council from imposing any tax on any portion of the personal income of an individual who is not a DC resident. Official text cited Source and notes.

Severance or production tax. Not part of AMR’s October 2026 tax review, which covered 25 producing states; that is not a finding that District of Columbia levies none. Use the state revenue agency’s own pages.

Not tax advice. Rates change and the cited source controls.

Sources for the dormant mineral rule

Each source was read on the date shown. Where an official site was not available, the official page was read through a dated Internet Archive copy and that is stated.

  1. D.C. Code § 47-1384 (only marketable title hit)Council of the District of Columbia, D.C. Law Library. Official statute. Read October 1, 2026, via the D.C. Council’s official code, publication of September 30, 2026. Source ID SRC-DC-001.
    “the provision shall be liberally construed as remedial legislation to encourage the foreclosure of the right of redemption by suits in the Superior Court and for the decreeing of marketable titles to real property sold by the Mayor.”

Open questions for a specialist

None recorded.

Common questions

Can mineral rights lapse in District of Columbia?

A search of District of Columbia’s official code found no dormant mineral, lapse or forfeiture statute, so an interest does not lapse through nonuse under a statute of that kind. Deeds, tax sales and title rules can still affect ownership.

Does District of Columbia allow forced pooling?

A search of District of Columbia’s official code found no forced pooling statute. The scope of that search is under Forced pooling above.

Does District of Columbia require payment for surface damage?

A search of District of Columbia’s official code found no surface damages statute of that kind. Leases, deeds and general law can still give the surface owner a claim.

What changed

The June 2026 edition listed District of Columbia as Does not lapse, lapse period none. Release 2026.10 replaced that entry with the reviewed rule above, and retired the June risk score and ranking for every state. Release 2026.10.1 added the deceased or unlocated owner section. See all changes.

Cite this page

American Mineral Registry. "Do Mineral Rights Expire in Washington, D.C.?" U.S. Mineral Rights Law Atlas, release 2026.10.1, October 6, 2026. https://americanmineralregistry.com/research/states/do-mineral-rights-expire-in-washington-dc

General information about statutes, not legal advice and not a title opinion. Facts about a specific interest decide the outcome. Published by American Mineral Registry, which also runs a commercial service for owners; see how the two relate.