Talisman Energy Plans to Drill Its First Shale Well in Poland This August

Talisman Energy Inc., the Canadian oil and gas explorer, plans in August to start drilling its first well to evaluate potential shale deposits in northern Poland, according to the company’s manager for the country.


“We’re planning to finalize negotiations on the drilling contract in mid-February, and drill one well on each of our three licenses,” Tom Maj said in an e-mail. “Drilling on the first well would start Aug. 1 and the last one would be completed around the end of January 2012.”


Poland’s reserves of shale and tight gas may be as much as 3 trillion cubic meters, according to estimates by geologists and energy consultants, potentially making the country a net exporter of gas and reducing Europe’s dependence on Russia.


Shale development, where rock formations are horizontally drilled and fractured using water and other liquids under high pressure, is driving a surge in U.S. gas output and in Poland drew interest from companies including Exxon Mobil Corp. and Chevron Corp.


Calgary-based Talisman licenses to search for shale gas are in the Baltic basin in northern Poland.


According to Maj, the company would be interested in trading data from exploratory drillings with owners of licenses in the same area. ConocoPhillips, the third-biggest U.S. energy company, and its eastern European partner Lane Energy Poland own neighbouring licences as well as LNG Energy Ltd., a Canadian oil and gas explorer, and Polskie Gornictwo Naftowe i Gazownictwo SA, Poland’s dominant natural gas distributor known as PGNiG.


‘Trading Data’


“We are interested in trading data with Lane Energy and LNG Energy, as well as the PGNiG, which own neighbouring licenses,” he said.


Lane Energy last year drilled two vertical wells at its license in northern Poland and plans to drill a horizontal well in the same area in the second quarter of 2011, Kamlesh Parmar, Country Manager at Lane Energy Poland, said Dec. 2.


LNG Energy on Jan. 10 announced that it has started drilling its first shale gas exploration well within the Slawno concession area. The company said in a regulatory statement that its well is located less than 60 kilometers (37 miles) from one of the wells drilled by ConocoPhillips and Lane Energy. LNG Energy plans to drill two more wells on its two other concessions in Poland in 2011.