March 21 (Reuters) - Occidental Petroleum ( OXY ) on

Friday closed the sale of its mineral and royalty rights,

spanning nearly 250,000 acres in the Denver-Julesburg (DJ) Basin

in Colorado, to Elk Range Royalties for $905 million.

The assets are being developed by operators, including

Chevron ( CVX ) and Civitas, who collectively accounted

for more than half of the wells drilled in 2024, Elk Range

Royalties said in a statement.

Occidental, in its fourth-quarter earnings report, disclosed

that it would divest a portion of its upstream assets, including

non-operated assets in the Rockies and Permian assets not

included in its near-term development plan, for a total of $1.2

billion.

The company plans to use the proceeds from these asset sales

to lower its debt, which increased following its $12 billion

purchase of privately-held CrownRock in August last year.

For the quarter ended December 31, 2024, Occidental reported

a net long-term debt of $24.98 billion.