CAPITAL: WARSAW
MONETARY UNIT: ZLOTY
REFINING CAPACITY: 382,000 B/CD
OIL PRODUCTION: 7,300 B/D
OIL RESERVES: 115 MILLION BBL
GAS RESERVES: 5 TCF
Poland planned to begin buying gas from Norway to reduce its dependence on Russian supplies.
The state exploration and distribution company, Poland Oil & Gas Co. (POGC), signed an agreement to buy 200 million cu m/year from Statoil AS by October 2001 and then 500 million cu m/year until October 2006.
The gas would be moved via Germany with Ruhrgas AG and VNG-Verbundnetz Gas acting as transporters.
The companies said the deal was part of plans for a bigger contract, under which Poland would start buying 5 billion cu m/year of Norwegian gas in 4 or 5 years.
Meanwhile, prompted by expectations that the Polish gas market would double during 2000-10, Gaz de France (GdF) and POGC announced an industrial and commercial cooperation agreement.
GdF would help develop the gas industry in Poland, including gas production and electricity generation.
Upstream, the agreement provided for the joint development of gas resources in the Baltic Sea and cooperation in underground gas storage. The two partners also would explore various domestic and cross-border gas pipelines.
Downstream, the partners would undertake joint electricity and heat generation from gas. They would also initiate natural gas vehicle use with a project in Cracovia.
Refining
In a process that took all of 2000, Poland short-listed bidders for the sale of up to 75% of its second-largest crude oil refinery, the 90,000-b/d Rafineria Gdanska.
It received six bids from domestic and foreign consortia and was expected to name the winner during 2001.
Poland raised $580 million in late November when it sold a 30% share in Polski Koncern Naftowy SA, the nation's leading refiner and distributor.
About half the 126 million shares sold on the Warsaw Stock Exchange went to foreign investors and half to domestic buyers. PKN became the second largest company traded on the exchange.
PKN had 75% of crude processing capacity in Poland and 40% of gasoline sales through its chain of 2,000 stations.
The company wanted to be able to raise funds to upgrade equipment and expand operations before the government fully opened the market to foreign competition.
PKN also wanted cash to build 300 service stations by 2002. New-car sales had nearly doubled demand for gasoline in Poland in 6 years.
Exploration
POGC completed a sour gas and oil processing plant in western Poland. The 55-MMscfd facility enabled production of an oil and gas field 500 km west of Warsaw near Debno.
The $50 million plant processed 8,300 b/d of oil and yielded 400 b/d of stabilized condensate, 800 b/d of LPG, 130 tonnes/day of sulfur, and 45 MMscfd of residue gas. To maximize air quality, the sulfur plant used technology that recovered 99.1% of hydrogen sulfide in the feed gas.
POGC bought 30% of a EuroGas Inc. subsidiary and became operator of a concession in southeastern Poland.
EuroGas held rights to 1,070,000 acres in 10 concessions. It said its geologists had identified 12 exploration targets in the Rymanow-Lesko area near Sanok. EuroGas and POGC planned a wildcat in 2001.
The Rymanow-Lesko area was between the Boryslaw oil region of Ukraine and the oil production region of Krosno in Poland. There were more than 25 oil and gas fields in the Carpathian petroleum province producing from the shallow Flysch.
EuroGas said most of the fields were expected to have deeper potential defined along trend. It said the Carpathian oil deposits were formed from many reservoir layers and accumulated in tight, mostly vertical overthrusted and sliced folds.
POGC began production from its Kleka-11 well in western Poland's Kleka East structure.
The well was in the Fences area on the Kleka East structure, 2 km southeast of POGC's Kleka field. It had 51% of the well, and FX Energy Inc., Salt Lake City, had 49%.
POGC was producing the field through its Kleka production facility.
The companies planned to drill their nearby Zaniemysl and Donatowo prospects in 2001.
The Polish company had discovered 10 fields with 1.3 tcf of reserves in and near the Fences Project area in the Rotliegendes trend and the Reef trend. More than 80% of POGC's gas reserves were in the 300,000-acre Fences Project Area.
Apache Corp., Houston, planned to develop its Tuchola 108-2 discovery on the Pomeranian Concession in northwestern Poland.
The hole, which flowed 9.5 MMcfdd, was Apache's first on the concession. The gas was from an interval in the Permian Main Dolomite at 8,318-8,514 ft. Apache was operator with 42.5%.
Tuchola 108-2 was 60 miles from the nearest production but only 3 miles from a gas pipeline. The last discovery in the Pomeranian area was in the mid-1980s.
