This chapter examines the main features of the ad hoc approach to energy governance focusing on its most representative historical application, the joint development of oil and gas. After a discussion of the failed attempts by the UN International Law Commission to develop principles governing shared oil and gas resources, it analyses in detail the structure, content and legal issues presented by agreements for the joint development of hydrocarbon deposits. It then moves to their proximate context, namely the principles applicable to the exploitation of hydrocarbon deposits in disputed and undelimited areas.