In Poland, major gas fields were discovered in area of the Polish Lowlands. Large gas fields are also known from the Carpathian Foreland and smaller ones – from the Carpathian Mts and Polish economic zone of the Baltic Sea (map). About three quarters of the gas resources are related to plays involving Miocene and Rotliegend formations and the remaining resources – to plays in the Cambrian, Devonian, Carboniferous, Zechstein, Jurassic and Cretaceous formations. In the Polish Lowlands, gas fields are related to the Permian in the Fore-Sudetic and Wielkopolska regions and the Carboniferous and Permian in the Western Pomerania. In these regions gas occurs in massive and block-type reservoirs with water or gas drive mechanism. In that area only four gas fields contain high methane gas. The remaining gas fields are characterized by presence of nitrogen natural gas with content of methane ranging from about 30 % up to over 80 %, that is nitrogen-methane or methane-nitrogen mixtures. Gas fields containing natural gas with nitrogen content over 90 %, called as „high nitrogen natural gas” (HNNG), are discussed in a separate section. In the Carpathian Foreland, natural gas fields are related to plays involving the Jurassic, Cretaceous and Miocene formations. The fields usually contain high methane natural gas with low content of nitrogen. The exception are here few natural gas fields containing high nitrogen concentrations. In this region gas occurs in structural-lithological multi-layer traps or, sometimes, massive-type reservoirs with gas drive mechanism. In the Carpathians, natural gas occurs in gas and oil-gas and oil-gas-condensate fields related to plays in the Cretaceous and Tertiary formations. The Carpathian fields are exploited using standard gas depletion drive mechanism. Produced gas is characterized by high content of methane (usually over 85 %) whereas average content of nitrogen is a few percent at the average. In the Polish economic zone of the Baltic Sea, there are two gas fields (B4 and B6) and two oil-gas fields (B3 and B8). At present the Polish Lowlands region accounts for 69.5 % of proven domestic resources of natural gas and the Carpathian Foreland – for 25.5 % of those resources. The resources of the Polish economic zone of the Baltic Sea and the Carpathians are subordinate, being equal 4.0 and 1.0 % of the proven domestic resources, respectively.
Table 1 shows exploitable resources of natural gas and degree of
exploration and development of the gas and oil and condensate fields in
individual parts of the country. The data given in this table refer to
resources of natural gas actually present in the gas fields and are not
converted to those of high methane gas (high methane gas = extracted
reserves x combustion heat of real gas / combustion heat of high methane
gas, that is about 34 MJ/m3). Table 1 NATURAL GAS - million m3
In the year 2010, exploitable resources of natural gas were found to be 147,393 million m3, that is 1,664 million m3 less than one year earlier. Resources of exploited fields were estimated at 121,58 billion m3, which corresponds to 82.5 % of total amount of all the exploitable resources. In the year 2010, economic resources of natural gas were estimated at 64.98 billion m3 . The above given total domestic resources include those of gas fields which are planned to be converted for use as underground natural gas storage facilities. Production from these gas fields has been stopped in order to use the remaining gas as gas cushion (base gas) throughout the time of operation of the storage sites. The Wierzchowice (5,557.12 million m3), Strachocina (121.5), Husów (372.88), Brzeźnica (45.59), Swarzów (28.80), Daszewo (27.72) gas fields were selected for conversion into underground storage facilities. In December 2010 Bonikowo Underground Natural Gas Storage Facility was officially opened. Total reserves of natural gas to be used as gas cushions are estimated at 6.48 billion m3. Underground natural gas storage facilities are also built in salt (Mogilno II and Kosakowo facilities) and hard coal deposits (Nowa Ruda facility). The Mogilno II facility is the first of that type already in use for natural gas storage and the Kosakowo facility is under construction. In turn, the Góra facility is used for storage of liquid fuels. Up to now, 11 licenses for running underground natural gas and liquid fuel storage facilities were issued. In the year 2010, domestic production of natural gas from exploitable gas resources was 5,496 million m3 (see Table 2), being 340 million m3 smaller than in 2009. Table 2
Domestic production of natural gas - in million m3
The figure given below shows changes in domestic resources and production of natural gas in Poland in the years 1989-2010.
Domestic production of natural gas covers about 40 % of annual consumption. At the current early stage of exploration there are some data available allowing to consider presence of shale gas and tight gas in Poland. The deposits are however still poorly documented, and their resources are difficult to constrain. Shale gas accumulations are likely to occur in the Upper Ordovician-Lower Silurian formations in the Baltic and Lublin-Podlasie Basins, as well as in the Lysogory and Bilgoraj-Narol blocks. These formations are currently subject to industry exploration activity. First estimates of reserves might be achieved only after representative quantity of exploration well will be completed and tested. Reliable documentation of reserves shell be available based on production decline curves after first 1-2 years of gas production. At this stage number of resources estimates are publically available, but these still should be regarded as rather speculative and characterized by high error bars. This is also a reason for inconsistency of these report with relation to each other. Report of US Energy Information Agency (ordered from Advanced Research Institute in 2011) refers to some 5,300 billion m3 of recoverable gas in the Baltic-Podlasie-Lublin basin, while in the Advanced Research Institute Report completed in 2009 resources of 3,000 billion m3 recoverable gas were suggested. Wood Mackenzie in 2009 published resources of recoverable gas in the Baltic-Podlasie-Lublin basin equal to 1,400 billion m3, while Rystad Energy in 2010 resources equal 1,000 billion m3. First results of drilling in 2010-2011 allowed to confirm presence of gas in the her discussed formations. Presence of tight gas accumulations is the most probable in the north-eastern rim of the Fore-Sudetic Monocline in the Rotliegend sediments developed in eolian facies. A few wells drilled in 2009-2011 east of Poznan confirmed presence of gas in Rotliegend tight sandstones in that region. List of natural gas fields (pdf) Accepted abbreviations: B - for solid minerals - mine in building process, for fuels - prepared for exploitation or trial period of the exploitation E - exploited G - underground natural gas storage facilities M - deposit crossed out of the annual report of mineral resources during analized period P - deposit covered by preliminary exploration (in C2+D category, for fuels – in C category) R - deposit covered by detailed exploration (in A+B+C1 category, for fuels – in A+B category) Z - abandoned deposit T - deposit exploited temporarily K - change of the raw material in deposit
Back to the website "Mineral resources of Poland". Prepared by: Martyna Czapigo |
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