30 U.S.C. § 212 : US Code - Section 212: Surveys; royalties; time payable; annual rentals; term of leases; readjustment on renewals; minimum production; suspension of operation

Search 30 U.S.C. § 212 : US Code - Section 212: Surveys; royalties; time payable; annual rentals; term of leases; readjustment on renewals; minimum production; suspension of operation

Each lease shall describe the leased lands by the legal
subdivisions of the public-land surveys. All leases shall be
conditioned upon the payment to the United States of such royalties
as may be specified in the lease, which shall be fixed by the
Secretary of the Interior in advance of offering the same, at not
less than 5 per centum of the gross value of the output of
phosphates or phosphate rock and associated or related minerals.
Royalties shall be due and payable as specified in the lease either
monthly or quarterly on the last day of the month next following
the month or quarter in which the minerals are sold or removed from
the leased land. Each lease shall provide for the payment of a
rental payable at the date of the lease and annually thereafter
which shall be not less than 25 cents per acre for the first year,
50 cents per acre for the second and third years, respectively, and
$1 per acre for each year thereafter, during the continuance of the
lease. The rental paid for any year shall be credited against the
royalties for that year. Leases shall be for a term of twenty years
and so long thereafter as the lessee complies with the terms and
conditions of the lease and upon the further condition that at the
end of each twenty-year period succeeding the date of the lease
such reasonable readjustment of the terms and conditions thereof
may be made therein as may be prescribed by the Secretary of the
Interior unless otherwise provided by law at the expiration of such
periods. Leases shall be conditioned upon a minimum annual
production or the payment of a minimum royalty in lieu thereof,
except when production is interrupted by strikes, the elements, or
casualties not attributable to the lessee. The Secretary of the
Interior may permit suspension of operations under any such leases
when marketing conditions are such that the leases cannot be
operated except at a loss.